Search for the Avatar
by Phoenixwind
Summary: One year after the defeat of the fire lord, a mysterious enemy attacks. Aang uses his Avatar powers to save his friends. Toph and Katara are together and go out in search of their friends. They meet the straw hat crew
1. One Year Later

AN: So for a while, I've been thinking about Avatar and One Piece. I though how difficult it could be for Toph to be in the One Piece world in that the world was mostly water. Yeah, she'd be awesome on land, but being on a ship could be hell for her.

I originally started writing the story with just her, but that was extremely difficult for me. So I added Katara.

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece or Avatar The Last Airbender

Katara sat shaking on the beach right at the edge of the ocean. She was still trying to figure out what had just happened. One minute she and her friends were having a reunion celebrating the one year anniversary of the fire lord's defeat, and then suddenly, without any warning, there were explosions all around them.

When the attack happened, everyone immediately looked towards Zuko, wondering if the fire nation was attacking again. Zuko swore that he did not order any attack, and Toph immediately confirmed that he was telling the truth. Zuko, along with his uncle, even did his best to stop the explosions, but there were far too many. She remembered all her friends jumping to the defense. Toph did her best to block oncoming explosions, which were coming from some kind of large sphere shaped object that would explode when they hit the ground, not unlike the flaming rocks the fire nation would catapult at their enemies. Aang tried to use all his bending techniques, but even he was overwhelmed. Even Sokka and Suki tried to help, but their weapons were no match for the explosions. All they could do was help Toph direct her earth shields.

Katara remembered choking on the smoke among the endless explosions. Finally she looked at Aang.

"I don't think we can win this one." She said tearfully.

Aang looked at her and shook his head sadly. "No, but we can still survive."

Katara looked at him confused. "How can we possibly get out of this?" She then dodged an explosion.

Aang did not answer. Instead, Katara watched as he went into the Avatar state. Her surroundings went black and all she could see were her friends and family. Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Suki, Mei, Tai Lee, Iroh, her father and among others. Then she felt herself falling. She quickly grabbed the nearest person by the ankle. She tried to reach for another, but they were too far away.

She never felt any impact from falling, just that she was suddenly completely under water. Luckily, she wasn't too disoriented and used her water bending to bring herself to the water surface and took a very deep breath once she emerged. She was still holding on to the other person's ankle and she looked to see that it was Toph, who was still submerged in water from the waist down. Katara quickly flipped her upright so she could breath and before Toph could even say anything, Katara used her bending to quickly speed herself towards the nearest shore. She could feel her adrenaline rushing. Upon reaching the shore, she let Toph down.

Toph still looking confused spoke. "Katara, what happened, where are we?"

Katara, still confused and scared herself snapped. "I don't know! Be quiet!" She then ran back into the ocean desperately looking for more of her friends.

"Aang!" She cried. "Sokka! Zuko! Suki! Is anyone else out there!" She ran back and forth in the ocean using her bending, but could not find any of her other friends. Had they drowned?

The smoke she had breathed in earlier had finally caught up to her and she felt herself coughing. She quickly ran back to shore where Toph was and collapsed from exhaustion. She began to sob.

"Katara…" Toph said quietly. Tears were beginning to run down her face.

Katara suddenly spoke quietly, "What if they are all dead."

…

Katara and Toph did not speak for the rest of the day. Night came, and Toph used her bending over some earth far from the beach to make a shelter. She made another for Katara, who was still down at the tide. It was cold that night. They had no blankets, and no one to make a fire. However, Toph was exhausted from what had happened earlier and had no problems falling asleep.

Katara left the beach late that night. She was finally calming down from all that had happened and had even decided that her friends must be alive somewhere. Aang wouldn't be that careless would he?

She felt bad for how she had treated Toph earlier. Toph was just as scared and confused as she was. She felt even worse when she saw that Toph had made a shelter for her too. Like Toph, she too fell asleep almost immediately.

Katara woke up the next day early, very hungry. She walked over to Toph's shelter to find the girl still asleep. Katara couldn't help but be somewhat amused. But she did not want to waste any time. She nudged Toph gently. "Toph wake up."

Toph did not even stir. So Katara nudged her more roughly.

Toph suddenly jolted awake. "What! What's happening?"

"Nothing, I was just waking you up." Katara said gently. "We need to find a town and find out where we are."

Toph suddenly remembered what had happened the previous day. "Oh right." Her expression suddenly turned solomn. "Katara do you know what happened?"

Katara sighed. "We were attacked by someone." She explained. "But we do not know who it was. It really did not look like we were going to live through it, but Aang…" Katara paused, "He went into the avatar state and sent us all here."

"But where is everyone else." Toph asked moving her feet around. "I didn't hear or feel anyone else on the beach yesterday and I still don't feel the others."

Katara sighed again. "I don't know, but I have hope that they are still alive somewhere." She was quiet. Her tone suddenly changed to more upbeat and hopeful. "But sitting on this beach won't help us find them! And I'm hungry."

Toph smiled. "Alright! Let's get food."

Katara and Toph began making their way in a direction where they hoped would be a town.

"Oh Toph, by the way." Katara began feeling a little embarrassed. "I'm sorry for yelling at you yesterday, and then ignoring you."

Toph grinned. "Oh it's ok, you'll pay me back somehow."

Katara laughed, "Is that so?"

…..

It did not take them too long to find a town, which was quite close to a beach. Katara spotted one off in the distance. As they made their way into the town, Katara was surprised at how lively it was. There were people everywhere, and so much food…

She ran up to the nearest fruit stand. She didn't have much money with her, but she didn't think fruit would cost that much. "How much for the apples!" She demanded. Toph followed closely behind and grabbed the edge of the stand.

The owner of the fruit stand looked at her and was a little frightened at both girls' gluttonous expressions. "50 berries each." He said.

Katara felt her insides drop. "Berries?" It hadn't occurred to her that this place may have a different currency.

"Yeah berries," The fruit stand owner laughed. "What did you think I meant." Not realizing that Katara was not paying any attention.

Katara's face went red. "I'll be right back!" She grabbed Toph by the wrist and ran from the fruit stand.

"This is bad." Katara said coldly. "We have no money!"

Toph smirked. "Well why don't we just steal food? I'm sure we can take on these people."

"Toph!" Katara snapped. "I don't want to be a criminal is a strange place!"

"Would you rather starve?" Toph said sarcastically. She was imagining berries as in the fruit and wouldn't mind having fifty of them.

Katara ignored Toph's last remark. "Hey I know! We'll just find work and earn up enough berries!"

Toph frowned. "Work? Great I'm too hungry to do any work."

Katara ran to the nearest building which looked like a bar. Toph walked slowly behind her. She found the bar tender and approached him.

"Excuse me," She spoke trying to sound as polite as possible. "But do you need help around here?"

The bar tender looked at her and laughed. "Well you are really cute, but I'm not looking to hire anyone right now." He thought for a moment. "I did hear that the brothel down the street is looking for more girls, and I'm sure you'd have no problem getting hired there."

Katara's face turned red from anger. "Absolutely not!" She suddenly turned around and grabbed Toph's wrist and stormed out of the bar.

"Hey Katara," Toph spoke. "He said that the brothel is hiring, why don't you want to work there?"

Katara's face was still red. "Toph, do you have any idea what a brothel is?"

Toph shrugged. "No, but at least its work?"

Katara fumed. "Not that kind!"

Just then, a creepy man approached them. He was tall, very large, had a graying beard and his cheeks were red, probably from being drunk. "Excuse me miss." He said in a squeaky voice. "But did I hear that you are going to work for a brothel?" His face then turned redder. "If you want, I'll be your first customer, I'll pay you well and you won't have to give your boss any commission…"

"No!" Katara screamed and almost instinctively, bended the water from the nearest canteen and whipped the man hard. He fell on his back completely dazed.

"Wow Katara, I thought you didn't want to be a criminal here." Toph laughed.

Katara frowned, "That was self defense."

"Hey!" Someone yelled. "That was fresh water! I don't care if you are a devil fruit user or not you have to pay for that!"

Katara sighed, "Oh no."

"Run!" Toph yelled, this time she grabbed Katara's wrist and ran dragging her along.

…

They stopped by a back alley hoping that they had lost the person who they had made angry, but Katara figured that they probably had the authorities after them.

"I didn't want to be a criminal." Katara said sadly. "But we might not have any choice!"

She wished that Sokka was with them. He'd know what to do or would at least formulate some kind of plan.

"Hey." A deep male voice behind them spoke. "You were the two in the market right?"

Toph and Katara both froze. "Toph! Why didn't you tell me someone was coming!"

"I…I…" Toph stuttered, "I didn't feel anyone nearby!"

Katara turned to look at the man. He wasn't standing on the ground, but floating! Her eyes widened, was he an airbender?

"Normally, I don't condone that kind of behavior." The man said. "But I did see that you were getting harassed by Noki, so I'll look past it this once. I'll even pay off your debt."

Katara felt a quick sigh of relief. How lucky could they be!

"And, it also seems that you two have no money and you look a little hungry. I'll let you come to my place and my wife can make something for you. Now follow me." The man landed on the ground and began to walk.

Katara was elated. This was almost too good to be true! She calmed herself down, she needed to be on her guard. Katara looked at the man they were following. He was tall, about middle ages, with short brown hair. He also wore thin rimmed glasses.

She then asked. "How is it that you can float? Are you an airbender?"

The man laughed. "Air bender? Don't tell me you kids still believe in those stories. No I just ate the float float fruit."

"Float float fruit?" Katara thought, "What's that?"

"Oh a devil's fruit ability that gives me the ability to float." The man explained. "It helps me to oversee everything in the town, which by the way, I am the mayor of. The name is Kenji."

"I'm Katara." Katara finally introduced herself.

"I'm Toph." Toph introduced. She hadn't spoken at all to the stranger until then. She figured she'd let Katara do all the talking.

Katara remembered hearing the man in town say the word devil's fruit. "Um Kenji, what is a devil's fruit?"

Kenji stopped suddenly. "Don't tell me you girls have been that sheltered. Did someone kidnap you two and try to sell you off here?"

Katara took slight offense to that. After her travels with Aang and her friends, she definitely did not think of herself as sheltered. "No we came here on our own, but we still do not know what devil's fruit are."

"I don't understand how that is possible, but I guess I'll explain." Kenji explained about devil's fruits, and the different kinds. He also explained how those with devil's fruit powers become anchor's in the ocean. He then talked about pirates wanting them.

"Pirates!" Katara and Toph both shrieked!

"Yes. And why are you kids so surprised! Were you really that sheltered!" Kenji exclaimed. "Don't you know that this is the great age of pirates!" He then talked about Gold Roger and the one piece.

Katara sighed. The great age of pirates, one piece, air bending being a myth… Where did Aang send them?

Toph finally spoke. "Hey, you said something about air bending being nothing but a story. What's that about?" She demanded.

Kenji sighed. "Really, where did you kids come from? And aren't you too old to believe in such things? Air bending, water bending, earth bending, fire bending, the avatar… it's all children stories that came from an old legend. Nothing more. Don't get me wrong, it would be nice if an avatar could come and bring peace to the world but it's just a legend."

"Oh yeah?" Toph challenged and began to take a stance, but Katara stopped her. "Toph don't, let's just let it go, we don't want to get into any trouble." She whispered.

They finally reached Kenji's house. His wife was inside and was a very beautiful woman. Kenji told her to make two more servings for dinner. Two children also ran into the house. As soon as dinner was ready, Katara and Toph ate their meals quickly after being so hungry. Katara was a little embarrassed with how sloppy she was eating but Kenji and his wife did not seem to mind too much.

"So, just where are you two from?" Kenji's wife asked.

Katara swallowed. "I'm from the southern water tribe." She replied hoping that Kenji or his wife would have heard of it. And she did not understand how they could not have. It was only the entire south pole she referred to.

Kenji and his wife looked at each other. "I've never heard of that." Kenji responded. "Which ocean is it in? The south blue?"

"Um yeah." Katara guessed. "It's in the south pole."

"South pole?" Kenji repeated oddly. "I didn't know people were living down there."

Katara became quiet. Just how far away did Aang send them?

Toph never said where she was from and Kenji and his wife just figured she was from the same place as Katara.

After dinner, Kenji's wife showed the two girls the guest bedroom. Katara did not plan on getting much sleep. She wanted to leave soon and head to the next island. Katara had heard from Kenji that the next closest island was about directly west, however, he warned her to not go out to sea by herself. Katara ignored the warning and figured she could just use her bending. She was very eager to find her friends.

She looked over at Toph who was sleeping. Toph was very powerful on land, but she would be almost no help on a boat. Her seasickness would not help either. Katara sighed, it would be all up to her to get them to the next island.

Hours later, she walked over and nudged Toph. "Toph wake up."

Toph stirred. "Is it morning yet?" she groaned.

"No, but we're leaving." Katara stated. "Now get up."

"Why are we leaving?" Toph asked. "I'm still tired."

"Because, we need to get a boat and get to the next island." Katara explained.

After waking up Toph and convincing her to go, Katara wrote a quick thank you note to Kenji and his family. Then she and Toph set out to find a boat.

A/N: Yeah there were some useless OCs. They won't appear very much if at all in the rest of the fic. I needed someone to explain about the world to Katara and Toph.

The straw hats will be in the next chapter. Other Avatar characters will appear from time to time.


	2. The Straw Hats

It wasn't hard for them to find a boat. They were able to find a dock with several small boats lined up. Katara figured it was a store. Though she didn't condone stealing, she made an exception in this case. She figured some day she would return and pay the person back once she had some money.

Katara and Toph climbed into the boat after untying it from the dock, and Katara used her bending to push the boat forward.

"So how long are we going to be in this thing?" Toph asked yawning. She was lying on her back with her eyes closed.

Katara sighed. "I really don't know. All I know is to go west and we should hit a large island."

"And how do you know which way is west?" Toph questioned skeptically. "You're not Sokka, you're not good with directions."

Katara frowned. "I looked at a map before getting this boat and that boat store was on the west side of the island!"

"Alright." Toph said rolling her eyes. "I just hope you know what you are doing."

Hours and hours past and there was no sign of land. Toph had fallen asleep after complaining of having a headache. Katara herself was feeling very tired, but she knew she had to stay awake.

The boat they were in suddenly started to rock violently. The ocean was very wavy as if there were a storm coming. Katara tried to steady the water but it was too much for her to handle.

"Hey what's happening?" Toph suddenly woke up and grabbed each side of the boat to keep herself from falling into the ocean.

"I don't know!" Katara shrieked. "The ocean just suddenly got very rough!"

A very giant fish suddenly emerged from beneath the ocean. It was round, white with two dark pink stripes that extended across its back, and two whiskers above its mouth. The fish moved towards them and opened its mouth.

Katara shrieked and tried to use her water bending to move the boat away from the fish. The fish's whisker whipped and slashed their small boat causing it to break apart almost immediately!

Katara and Toph fell into the ocean. Katara used her water bending to hold herself on top of the water. She didn't know whether to fight the fish or save Toph.

"Katara!" Toph cried before submerging under water.

Katara had tears in her eyes. She quickly used her bending to pull Toph above the water, and immediately used her bending again to slash the fish with the water whip. The fish only blinked.

She suddenly saw two flashes of light and then felt someone grabbing the back of her shirt. She then felt herself being pulled quickly back words. Before she could process what had happened, Katara felt herself being placed on what she assumed what a ship. She was on her knees breathing heavily.

"What were you two doing on the Grand Line in that little boat!" A female voice scolded.

Katara looked up to see a girl slightly older than her with orange hair. On either side of her was a girl with long blue hair pulled back into a pony tail and a boy with a straw hat who was grinning.

Toph was coughing hard, spitting out water, and a creature, that Katara thought looked like a teddy bear, ran to her aid.

"We were just trying to make it to the next island, and I heard it was east of the one we were just on." Katara explained. "We're trying to find our friends."

The orange haired woman looked at her. "But you were going south." She said bluntly.

Katara's face dropped. "But how? I don't think we changed direction…"

"Do you know anything about navigation?" The orange haired girl questioned.

Katara blushed. "No nothing."

The orange haired girl sighed. The girl with blue hair smiled and spoke. "Are you two alright? I'm sure that was scary. My name if Vivi by the way, and these two are Nami and Luffy. Over there is Chopper."

"I'm fine, and Toph will be too." Katara pointed over to Toph, who was still coughing. "My name is Katara." Katara was about to ask what Chopper was when Luffy interrupted.

"Hey Katara, what was that cool thing you were doing with the water?" Luffy asked looking very excited.

"Yeah, we first thought you were a devil fruit user, but you didn't drown when you fell into the ocean." Nami added.

"Oh that," Katara spoke. "I'm a water bender." She was hoping that one of these people would have heard of bending. She then used her bending skills to bend the water off her and Toph's clothes making them dry.

"So cool!" Luffy shrieked. Katara could practically see stars in his eyes.

"Water bender?" Nami questioned. "I've only heard about that in stories, I didn't know they actually existed." She paused. "I guess there are strange things out on the Grand Line."

"I too have only heard of benders in stories." Vivi agreed. She paused. "And they were always the bad guys…"

"We're not evil!" Katara jumped in, her heart had started to race. She did not want to make enemies with these people. It was doubtful that they would see another ship pass by.

"We didn't say you were." Nami spoke. "And doesn't matter if you were. You-"

"Is she a water bender too?" Luffy interrupted, pointing towards Toph.

Katara was about to answer but Toph spoke first. She had finally finished coughing. "No, I'm an earth bender." She raised her head and Chopper got a good luck at her eyes.

"Oh no, you're blind!" Chopper shrieked as Luffy shouted 'so cool' once again. "How did that happened, maybe I could…"

"I was born blind." Toph responded somewhat groaning. "And don't worry, I can see fine with my feet."

"Your feet?" Luffy asked looking very confused. "Do they have eyes?"

"No stupid!" Nami answered and hit Luffy over the head. Though she wondered for a second if Luffy was right. They had seen many strange things on the Grand Line.

Two other men approached the group. "Well that was easy," Said the one with green hair.

"If he hadn't swam away so fast I would have cooked him for-" Another man with blond hair began but suddenly stopped when noticed Katara. His eyes turned to hearts and Katara began to feel very uncomfortable. "Wow we saved a very beautiful girl from the ocean!" He moved closer to her but Nami hit him in the back of the head before he could get too close.

"Sanji not now!" Nami scolded.

"Yes Nami-swan." Sanji replied. He now had a large bump on the top of his head.

"Hey who are these two?" A man with a long nose came out from the cabin.

Nami sighed. "Katara, Toph, this is Usopp, Sanji, and Zoro." Nami pointed to each member. "Guys, this is Katara, and Toph."

"Usopp! Katara is a water bender and Toph is and earth bender! It's so cool!" Luffy bragged.

"Benders?" Usopp questioned. "I've only heard about those in stories."

Katara was about to speak again when her stomach growled loudly. She blushed.

"Oh are you hungry?" Luffy asked laughing. "Sanji, make Katara and Toph some food. Actually, make me something too."

Sanji's eyes became hearts again. "I will go make Katara-chan and Toph-chan some delicious food!" Sanji immediately went into the ship's cabin.

Luffy laughed. "Sanji makes the best food." He then pointed towards the door. "Let's go into the dining hall. Maybe we'll find snacks."

Katara and Toph stood up. Both were very hungry as they only had a very small breakfast.

"Toph, are you going to be alright?" Chopper asked sounding very concerned. He wasn't sure how Toph was going to find her way to the dining hall.

"I'll be fine," Toph replied sounding a little nauseous. She took two steps and almost immediately tripped over some kind of tool on the floor. "Ouch."

"Toph!" Chopper shrieked and grabbed her arm helping her to stand up. He guided her towards the dining hall. Toph reluctantly agreed to accept his help.

Katara laughed and began to follow. That was when she noticed the flag on top of the ship blowing in the wind. It was a skull and cross bones wearing a straw hat. Her insides became cold. Were they really on a pirate ship?

AN: Ok this chapter was hard to write. I tried to keep everyone in character and I tried not to ignore anyone. I always find meeting chapters to be the hardest to write. This one was also very dialogue driven XD

Also, I wasn't sure how to handle the Toph and Sanji dynamic. Yeah Sanji flirts with every girl he sees, but Toph also still looks, well not like a kid, but prepubescent?


	3. Pirates

Katara felt very nervous as she sat with the "pirates" at the dining table. They did not seem like bad people, but she also knew that looks could be deceiving. She was also surprised at how friendly they were. Normally, she would have expected pirates to tie up both her and Toph and throw them into some room, or completely ignore them when they were in the ocean fighting the sea king. She watched as Luffy stuffed food into his mouth and couldn't help but think that he was worse than Sokka.

She noticed that the ocean was very calm once the large fish had stopped attacking, and that was the only reason Toph was able to eat. Otherwise, the girl would be puking over the side of the boat.

Katara took a bite of her food. She had to admit that it was very delicious.

"So..." She began. "You guys are pirates?" Katara couldn't help but bring this up.

"Yep." Luffy said with a mouthful of food and sounding very proud of himself. "And I'm going to be the pirate king."

"Really." Katara said sounding noticeably shocked. She couldn't believe how casual he was as he said this. She eyed Toph, but she did not seem the least bit concerned. "Where is this ship heading."

"We're going to Alabasta where Vivi lives." Nami explained. "And we are going to help her save her country."

Katara felt very confused. "You're going to help her?" She wished she knew the right questions to ask in this situation. She imagined how Sokka, Zuko, and Aang would have acted.

Sokka (In an over exaggerated interrogator's voice): "So, just what are pirates doing helping out a princess?"

Zuko(very calm): "Why do you even care what happens to her country. Aren't you pirates?

Aang (overly excited): "You're helping out the princess? Cool! I'll help too!"

Katara groaned in her mind.

Vivi noticed Katara's expression and spoke. "Don't worry Katara, they are not the bad kind of pirates. For as long as I've been with them, they have helped many people." She smiled as she spoke.

Katara was about to ask who they have helped, but Toph spoke first.

"What happened to your country?"

Vivi sighed and explained everything that had happened in Alabasta, from Crocodile, to the baroque works, to infiltrating baroque works, and to finally meeting the straw hats.

It was a lot for Katara to take in. She still couldn't believe that pirates would help someone out. She wondered if they were promised some kind of reward…

"Hey Katara and Toph." Luffy spoke. "You two should join our crew." His smile was huge as he said this."

Katara gulped. Join a pirate crew? "Well Toph and I need to find our friends… I don't know if we have time for sailing." She blushed as she spoke. She wasn't the best at coming up with excuses at a moment's notice.

"Huh?" Luffy looked confused. "Do you know where they are?"

"No." Katara shook her head sadly. "And they could be anywhere in the world."

Luffy smiled. "There you go, you can look for them while you are part of the crew. We will be sailing to the end of the grand line, so you'll probably run into them somewhere."

"Um…" Katara did not know what to say.

Zoro noticed that Katara seemed a bit uncomfortable. "Don't worry, we're not like the pirates you are probably used to."

Katara became quiet. "We'll think about it." She did not want to say anything to anger them.

A/N: Ah this was a hard chapter to write! Katara would definitely not immediately trust the Straw Hat crew knowing that they are pirates. I also had trouble writing her reaction in some places, which is why I wrote up the scenario with Sokka, Zuko, and Aang.

Oddly enough, if it were just Toph, I could see her agreeing to join up as soon as she was asked, and wouldn't ask many questions…


	4. Katara's Decision

Chapter from Toph's POV

It was the day after meeting the Straw Hat pirates. The sea was rocky and Toph hung herself over the edge of the ship feeling very nauseous. She had always hated traveling on a boat. Last night before going to bed, she questioned Katara about why she was so against joining the crew. To Toph, it seemed like the perfect way to search for their friends and the Straw Hats seemed like good people. Katara explained that she did not fully trust them because they were pirates. Toph argued that they trusted Zuko to be Aangs fire bending teacher and Katara had argued back that that was a completely different situation. She also added that she did not initially trust Zuko.

Because of her being seasick, Toph almost agreed with Katara that it might not be a good idea to join the crew. How would she ever survive on a ship anyway? The ship was made out of wood and she was unable to use her feet to see. She would be sick anytime they traveled.

"Toph-chan! I have some medicine for you!" Chopper ran toward her.

Toph pulled herself off of the rail and smiled. "Thank you that will really help!" She then thought about swallowing the pills and felt even more nauseous. She threw herself back over the side of the ship. "I don't think I can swallow those!"

"Oh no!" Chopper face faulted and panicked. "Well I have these sea sick patches for you then!"

Toph pulled herself back over the edge of the boat once again. "Well, why didn't you give those to me first." She was very annoyed but took the patches from Chopper as he laid them in her hand. "Where do I put them?"

Chopper instructed how to use the sea sick patches and after applying them, Toph laid down on her back, her arms out to her side. "How long till they work?" she asked.

"About 15 to 20 minutes." Chopper replied sounding a little frightened of Toph.

"Not soon enough." Toph grumbled closing her eyes. She wiped sweat from her forehead.

"I'm sorry that is the best I have!" Chopper seemed to panic once again. "Should I get you a cold cloth for your forehead!"

"Yeah sure," Toph said sounding sickly and Chopper ran off. She didn't really want the cloth, just to be left alone. She was though, happy that someone had provided her with some medication. Now just to see if it worked…

Earlier before feeling sick, she was sitting with Nami, Vivi, and Katara. They were chatting about things that Toph did not really care about. Surprisingly, Katara seemed to get along well with the two other girls. Maybe she was changing her mind about the crew?

Chopper arrived back to her quickly and gave her the wet towel. He left shortly after asking how she was feeling and went over to Luffy and Usopp.

Toph hated being on the boat. The only way she could tell where everybody was, was by listening for their voices or recognizing their footsteps, all of which she had memorized. She knew that Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper were on the opposite side of the Going Merry than she was. She heard them saying "Watch this!" To each other, followed by laughter, and had no idea what they were doing. Carue was also with them. Nami, Vivi, and Katara were on the above deck still chatting about various topics. Zoro was at the front of the Merry lifting weights, which she could hear clanking together. She did not know where Sanji was, but she assumed he was in the kitchen.

In no time at all, she felt much better. Happily, she stood up and walked into the direction of Chopper's voice. As she made her way over, she heard Sanji exit the cabin and offer Nami, Vivi, and Katara drinks.

"Hey Chopper, those sea sick patches were great! I don't feel sick at all anymore!" Toph was genuinely grateful to him.

There was a pause, followed by Chopper speaking very happily "No I'm not happy that you complemented me you asshole!"

Toph became confused. "But you seem happy about it."

"Toph-chan, would you like this fruit drink I made for you!" Sanji called to her. She heard his footsteps approaching.

"Don't tell me you are hitting on Toph now?" Nami's voice was heard from further away.

"No, of course not Nami-swan, Toph is much too young!" Sanji paused. "However I must nurture her so that she one day grows up to be a beautiful young woman!" What Toph couldn't see, was Sanji's eyes turning to hearts. If anybody were able to read his mind, they would see that he was imagining Toph much older, with her hair flowing loosely down her to her waist, wearing a light green kimono with pink flowers, large breast noticeable through the kimono, and her expression was that of pouty face, eyes glistening.

"You're disgusting." Usopp, Nami, and Katara all said at once.

"I'm not a little kid you know." Toph said feeling very annoyed. She did accept Sanji's drink. And she had to admit, it was very tasty.

Toph sat with Luffy, Usopp, Carue, and Chopper. She had difficulty figuring out what they were doing most of the time, but they were entertaining. Usopp reminded her of Sokka and Luffy of Aang. Luffy and Chopper taught her to put chop sticks into her mouth and nose. The group cracked up laughing after she did so, however, Toph did not understand why it was so funny.

"Hey Toph, what is your power again?" Luffy asked.

"I'm an earth bender." She replied proudly, but then was reminded that there was no earth to work with. "It's like what Katara does, but with earth. I can bend metal too."

"Metal." Usopp repeated. He suddenly handed her something metallic. "Can you bend that? It's a nail."

Toph smiled. "No problem." She closed her hand concentrated, feeling the earth particles in the nail, and when she opened her hand, the nail was now in the shape of a perfectly round ball.

"So cool!" Chopper, Luffy and Usopp said at once. Carue squawked in amazement.

"Hey I have another idea." Usopp said and headed off before anyone could ask what it was.

He came back shortly and Toph heard a clinking sound. He sat what she assumed was a box in front of her.

"In there are several bent screws and nails that have been used to repair the Merry," He started. "Can you straighten them?"

Toph smiled once again. "No problem." She picked up each nail one by one and made it so they were their original form.

"Great now we can reuse those!" Usopp exclaimed.

Toph then heard Katara's footsteps coming towards her. "How are you doing Toph?"

"Oh I'm fine." Toph replied. "Chopper gave me some medicine and I don't feel sick anymore."

"That's good." Katara sounded relieved. "Well can I talk to you for a minute in private?"

"Um sure," Toph replied. She stood up and began to follow Katara.

"Hey Toph," Luffy called to her. "When you are finished, come back and we'll go fishing! You can join us Katara!"

"Alright." Toph replied and continued to follow Katara.

"Maybe." Katara answered Luffy.

Toph followed Katara into the women's quarters of the ship. She sat on the bed she had used the night before and waited for Katara to speak.

"I was talking to Nami and Vivi," she began. "About everything that had happened to our home and how we ended up here. And they were both very confused. We talked about the possibilities of where this place is compared to where we came from." Katara paused. "Nami drew a picture of what the world looked like, and well, it was nothing like ours. Here there are four oceans known as the North Blue, South Blue, East Blue, and West Blue, as well as the grand line, which is between the oceans and circles around the center of the world. There is also a thin line of land known as the red line that circles around the world vertically. And well, that is nothing like where we came from."

Toph was quiet. "What does that mean?"

"Well, Nami suggested that maybe we somehow crossed dimensions." Katara spoke. "Like we are in some kind of parallel world."

"But they have heard of bending, even though they do not think it exists." Toph argued. "How do you explain that?"

"I brought that up to Nami, and she suggested that maybe the two worlds are connected somehow." Katara explained. Toph did not understand how she could sound so calm.

"I also think." Katara began sounding very unsure of herself. "That we will travel with them, at least through Alabasta. We do not know much about this world and we can't travel it by ourselves."

Toph smirked. "I was hoping you would say that. I don't think they are bad people."

Katara sighed. "I don't think so either, but if they do anything bad to anyone, we will leave them."

"We?" Toph challenged, her tone sounded annoyed. "So I have to do what you say?"

Katara frowned. "Toph, you are a bit helpless in this world. Most of it is ocean, and to tell you the truth, you do not have the best social skills and you can be kind of mean to people. What would you do if you got separated from them? Or what if they betrayed you?"

"What if I got separated from you?" Toph replied sarcastically completely ignoring her second point. "And I'm not completely helpless you know! I could find my way around just fine on land!" Toph was quiet for a minute. "And remember when I was the blind bandit in the fire nation! I could make money just fine!"

"Yeah but you got caught." Katara pointed out.

Toph huffed. "Fine, whatever. But I will still do what I want."

Katara was quiet. Toph was sometimes hard for her to reason with. "I am going to go tell Luffy that we will stay with them, at least for a little while.

"I'll go with you," Toph said. "Luffy said we would fish after I was finished talking with you."

Katara and Toph made their way out to the deck of the ship.

A/N: Wow it's hard to write from Toph's POV!

And I didn't mean to make Katara sound bitchy. She and Toph do tend to clash even though they care for one another. Since Katara is motherly, I don't see her wanting to separate from Toph, no matter the reason.


	5. New Nakama

A/N: Alright I'm going to have to do something that some people might hate me for. I'm going to add some enemies for Katara and Toph to fight. At first I was going to have them fight the five pair, but I figured that would be kind of lame because they were already defeated. So I'm going to have to do something unholy and give Mr. 2 a partner… I want them to be able to take down a boss like the other straw hats so that they will feel more like part of the crew. I'll try to keep any added characters minimal.

"Hey Luffy," Katara began as she approached the Straw Hat captain. Toph stood next to her.

"Hmm?" Luffy looked at her. Chopper and Usopp sat on either side of him.

Katara took a deep breath. "Toph and I have decided to join your crew. At least for a little while."

Luffy's eyes widened with excitement. "Really! Awesome! Hey everyone! Katara and Toph and are joining the crew!"

"Alright! New nakama!" Chopper cheered.

"Finally we have more girls." Nami said approvingly from up on the deck.

"Yay! Katara-chan and Toph-chan are joining!" Sanji exclaimed with hearts in his eyes.

"We need to celebrate!" Usopp added.

The crew was soon gathered around a table, rum poured into wooden mugs.

Luffy held up his mug and everyone soon followed. "To our new nakama, Katara and Toph!"

"Cheers!" Everyone shouted. The crew began to gulp down their drinks save for Katara and Toph.

"Why isn't mine full?" Toph questioned, noticing that her mug was only about half filled.

"Toph-chan, you're still a kid, we can't have you drinking too much." Sanji explained.

"I'm not a little kid." Toph replied sounding very annoyed. She took a drink of her rum and immediately spat it out. "Ew, that's disgusting! Give me water instead."

"Don't waste it!" Zoro shouted his face taking on a demonic that Toph, luckily, could not see.

"See Toph," Usopp began grinning. "This is a grown up drink."

"Shut up!" Toph suddenly nudged him in the rib cage, which hurt much more than he expected.

Katara looked into her mug. Should she really be drinking? She was underage… But she didn't want to be rude, and no one from back home would find out…

Katara gulped her drink down quickly. She thought it had a strange taste but it wasn't nearly as unbearable as Toph made it sound. Sanji poured her a second.

…10 minutes later….

Katara giggled loudly and slapped the table. "Annd denn I trapphed her into water and frosh her hands together!" She hic upped. "I totally won, and Aangh and I are going to live happily ever after!"

Nami raised an eyebrow. "How many has she had?"

"One." Usopp replied. "But she did take a few sips of a second…"

Nami groaned. "Is this her first time drinking?"

"Katara, maybe you need to sit down!" Vivi coaxed as Katara climbed onto the table where the other mugs were."

"Katara! Try this!" Luffy stuck chop sticks in his nose down to his mouth, Chopper and Usopp followed.

"Oh I can do that!" Katara exclaimed and followed Luffy's example. "See!"

"Alright Katara!" Luffy cheered.

Toph laughed. "Wow, I've never knew Katara could be like this. When we finally meet Aang, Sokka and the others I'm telling them everything."

"Katara-chan! You're so beautiful!" Sanji complemented with hearts in his eyes."

"And you're so handsome Sanji!" Katara replied not even looking his way.

Sanji's heart eyes suddenly got much bigger. "Katara-chan! That makes me so hap-"

He was suddenly hit in the back of the head by Zoro. "Don't take advantage of this situation!"

The very next day, Katara awoke with a major headache. She did not remember going to bed or much of the party the Straw Hats threw for her and Toph. No one else was in the women's quarters with her.

She walked up to the ship's deck and was greeted by Nami and Vivi.

"Are you feeling ok?" Nami asked smiling.

"A little sick." Katara replied yawning. "What happened last night?"

"You were trashed after one drink." Nami stated. She then proceeded to explain all that had happened the previous night.

Katara's face was beet red. She couldn't believe that she had done everything that Nami had described. But Vivi nodded her face confirming that it had all happened.

"I'm so embarrassed." Katara spoke her head down.

"Don't worry about it." Nami responded. "It's not like you were any worse than Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper."

"Was Toph drinking too?" Katara asked sounding concerned.

"No." Vivi replied giggling, "She took one drink and decided she didn't like it."

"Really." Katara groaned, not at all surprised. She was about to say something else when she heard Toph's voice from the lower deck.

"Hey I think I got something big!"

Katara looked to see that she was fishing with Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper. Katara was happy that she at least found something to do on the ship.

"Ooh what is it!" Luffy and Chopper both chimed at the same time.

Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp all grabbed Toph's fishing pool to help reel in the catch. A huge figure attached to the fishing pole flew through the air and landed on the deck. Katara looked at what they had caught and to her surprise; it was a very oddly dressed person. It was a man that wore what looked like a woman's outfit complete with swans on the shoulders. He also wore very heavy makeup, more than Katara had ever worn.

"What did I catch?" Toph asked sounding very excited.

"An okama!" Nami, Vivi, Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper all said at once.

"A what?" Toph asked never having heard the word.

No one had time to answer Toph as the man began to speak.

"Thank you very much, you are all wonderful people!" He said sounding very excited. "I will never forget this! I was saved by pirates that I don't even know!"

"I wasn't really trying to save you, but the pleasure is all mine." Toph replied sounding proud of herself. She wasn't able to see the man and had no idea how odd he looked to everyone else. She also couldn't see the other straw hat pirate's very confused expressions.

"You are too kind young girl!" The man approached Toph and shook her hand quickly.

Katara, not being from this world, had no idea if it was common for people to dress and act like this person. She eyed Vivi who had a very unsure look on her face. She even swore she heard her whisper 'this guy is weird!' Katara felt slightly better.

"So you can't swim either?" Luffy asked in a tone that suggested he saw nothing odd about the man.

"Yes I ate a devil fruit." The man responded.

"Really?" Usopp suddenly became interested. "Which one?"

The man paused, then grinned. "Well since I have to wait for my ship to come back, I think I'll put on a little show for everyone." He looked at Luffy. "This is my power!" Without warning, he hit Luffy on the face very hard causing him to fall backwards.

"Luffy!" Everyone cried and got ready to fight.

"Wait!" motioned everyone to stop. "This is my show!"

Everyone looked closer at the man, and saw that he had Luffy's face!

"Huh my face!" Luffy exclaimed looking very surprised.

The man touched his face with his left hand and his face turned back to its original. "This is the power of the Mane Mane fruit. Left hand changes it back to normal. And I can become all of you." The man touched everyone's face, much more gentler than he had touched Luffy's. He became Zorro, Usopp, Chopper, Katara, Vivi, Toph, and finally Nami. "And I even get the body the exact same!" With that he opened his shirt exposing Nami's body to everyone. Katara quickly looked down blushing and most of the men looked amazed.

"Stop it!" Nami was not amused and hit the man over the head who changed himself back to normal quickly.

"You're so awesome!" Luffy, Usopp and Chopper exclaimed. Zoro acted as though unimpressed and Nami was still upset. Katara was still a little embarrassed at what had happened, but she was amused by his abilities. And Vivi looked like she was a bit impressed.

Toph smiled smugly. "Sorry, but your talent doesn't do anything for me." Her comment was drowned out by Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp squealing over the okama.

"Show us more!" Luffy demanded.

The man grinned. "I have a perfect memory too! Every face I touch I remember!" The man tapped his face and became many different people.

"Wha-" Katara heard Vivi say at one point.

"Ridiculous." Zoro commented.

"So cool!" Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp exclaimed when the man was finished. All four put their arms around each other and began to dance.

"Someone kill them." Nami groaned. She looked out to the distance. "Hey a ship is coming, is that yours?"

The man looked towards the direction where Nami was pointing. "I'm sorry but I must leave you all now!"

"Awe." Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp sounded said.

"Do not be said, separation is inevitable! Do not forget me!" He prepared himself to jump on his ship. "Length of time means nothing to true friendship!" With that, he leaped off the Going Merry and onto his ship.

"We'll see you again!" Luffy called out to him.

Everyone heard one of the man's ship mates address him. "Mr. 2, Bon-Clay, we were so worried!"

The Straw Hats all went cold, save for Katara and Toph.

"Mr. 2!" Luffy and Nami shrieked.

"That was Mr. 2!" Vivi cried. She looked as though she could burst into tears.

"Vivi, didn't you recognize his face?" Luffy asked sounding serious.

"No I've never met him before." She bit her lip. "But I did hear that he was an okama who wore a swan coat with okama-way written on the back."

"You should have noticed." Everyone said at once.

"Where was his partner?" Katara asked. Vivi had explained to her the structure of Baroque Works, and how each agent had a partner to complement their abilities the day before.

"Miss Halloween…" Vivi paused. "I hear they do not travel together often. Only when Crocodile gives them an assignment." Vivi was quiet again, and then suddenly looked as though she would burst into tears. "And one of those faces he showed us…" Vivi paused, "Was my father, what could he do with my father's face!"

"You could definitely do bad things with a ruler's face." Zoro said.

"We just let a very dangerous guy get away." Usopp sounded very disappointed.

"He was an enemy?" Toph spoke. He was the strangest and most friendly enemy she had ever encountered. "But he seemed like he was a lot of fun."

"He will be very dangerous if he finds out we are his enemies. If he uses his power to turn into one of us, we won't be able to trust each other." Nami pointed out.

"But now that we know what he can do, can't we be prepared for it?" Katara asked then thought that sounded a bit like something Sokka would say.

Zorro grinned. "Yes we can. We can use counter measures."

Sanji was called out to the deck, unaware of all that he had missed. Zoro suggested that they take a marker, and mark and X on everyone's left wrist, then cover it up with a white bandage. That way, if the group had gotten separated and came across another member, they would show each other their X to confirm that they were the real person and not an imposter.

"But what about me?" Toph asked, I won't be able to tell if someone has the X.

Nami's eyes widened. "That's right, you won't be able to see it…"

"Could be put something over the X that she could feel?" Sanji suggested.

Everyone was quiet not sure if that would work.

"Well, to tell you the truth." Toph began. When he impersonated different people, his footsteps never changed. So I should be able to figure out if it is him or one of you guys that way."

Everyone nodded figuring that would have to work for her.

"And don't worry." Katara looked at Toph. "I'll make sure that you and I at least don't get separated."

Toph groaned. Katara kept treating her like a little kid that needed supervision.

Everyone soon had an X marked on their wrist and a bandage to cover it up.

"From now on." Luffy started. "This X is the mark of our friendship!" Everyone put their left hand out to form a circle. Toph was guided by Chopper.

A/N: God I felt so dirty making Katara drink XD. She feels so innocent next to the straw hat pirates. But Avatar is on Nickelodeon. I also felt awkward about the Mr. 2/Nami flashing with her.

Next chapter they will be in Alabasta.

There are very few Avatar and One Piece crossover fan art. But I found this one that I really like. My favorite part is Iroh flirting with Robin because I can totally see that happening.

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Oda has also assigned a color to each One Piece character. I added Katara and Toph into it for fun.

Luffy: Red

Zoro: Green

Nami: Orange

Usopp: Yellow

Sanji: Blue

Chopper: Pink

Robin: Purple

Franky: Cyan

Brooke: Black and white

Katara: Indigo

Toph: Dark green

Someone also asked in the SBS in the manga what nationality they resemble the most (If they were real people). Here is what Oda put as well as what Toph and Katara would obviously be.

Luffy: Brazil

Zoro: Japanese

Nami: Swedish

Usopp: African

Sanji: French

Chopper: Canadian

Robin: Russian

Franky: American

Brooke: Austrian

Katara: Inuit

Toph: Chinese


	6. Alabasta

A/N: Right now I do not have any plans for shipping any of these characters, except for canon pairings. (And we know how many of those are in One Piece.)

Unnamed: Don't worry, I have plans for a certain psycho fire bending princess ;)

Arekanderu: There is a reason why I started the story before Robin joined the crew

The Going Merry sailed closer and closer to the island of Alabasta. Katara felt the air become much warmer. It would be nice to finally be on land again. Toph could not agree more. Every day, she would ask how much longer till reaching to Alabasta.

"To a restaurant first!" Luffy cried raising his arms into the air.

Everyone else on the crew rolled their eyes.

The ship docked at a port town that Vivi called Nanohana. Once the ship was docked, Luffy immediately jumped off and ran into the town, screaming food.

"Luffy you idiot!" Nami cried after him. "Get back here!" But Luffy was too far gone to hear her. "I wish he would pay attention to the bounty on his head." She groaned.

Vivi looked very concerned. "What should we do? Nanohana is a very large town; it will be very difficult to search for Luffy."

Sanji grinned. "Don't worry Vivi, we'll just look in the noisiest part of the town. We'll be sure to find him there."

Toph was the first person after Luffy to step off the ship off. "Finally land!" She stamped her foot down hard, while at the same time, used her earth bending to create a hole in the shape of her foot.

"So cool!" Chopper and Usopp said at once admiring her ability. Now that she and the entire crew, save for Luffy who was too far away, were on solid earth, she had a much better idea of their body shape. She was surprised to find that Usopp had a long nose.

"Toph, don't you need shoes?" Vivi asked concerned.

Toph smiled. "Nah shoes make it too hard to see with my feet."

"Wow, so you can tell where everyone and everything is by using your feet?" Chopper asked, seeming to forget that Toph had somewhat explained this a few days ago.

"Yep." Toph replied. She pointed to each crew member and mentioned them by name. "And I know that there is a tree there." She pointed to a tree. "And a bench." She pointed to a bench. "And the land ends right there." She pointed to the water's edge.

Zoro looked at Katara. "Do you think she'll be ok?"

Katara sighed. "She'll be able to get around just fine. But I worry about her getting into trouble. She has gotten arrested for using her ability to scam." Katara neglected to inform Zoro that she was in on that particular scam and was arrested with Toph. "As long as she is around me, I should be able to keep her out of trouble."

Zoro nodded.

Katara then thought about the captain. "Should we look for Luffy?"

"He should be fine on his own." Zoro replied.

Vivi over heard the conversation. "We need to get different clothes first; we'll stick out with what we are wearing right now and attract attention."

"I'll take care of that Vivi-sama!" Sanji said with hearts in his eyes. He sped off to what was hopefully the nearest clothing store.

Nami groaned. "Great, we don't need to lose anyone else."

Katara admired the city of Nanohana as she waited for Sanji. She had never seen buildings that looked like the ones in the town. She wondered if she would see more in this world that they were in.

Sanji was not gone long. He passed out clothing he bought to everyone. After changing into their new clothing Katara was embarrassed at what Sanji had picked out for her. It was a red with black dancer girl outfit. Nami and Vivi had the same outfit but in different colors. Toph had a typical yellow desert robes.

"Um Sanji," Vivi began somewhat sharing Katara's concern. "These make us look like dancers and not normal citizens."

"That's ok! Dancer's are citizens, as long as they do not find out that you are a princess and a pirate then it will be ok!" Sanji said all this with hearts in his eyes..

"But walking through the desert in these will be…" Vivi began to protest but was cut off.

"If you get tired I will carry you!" Sanji exclaimed completely ignoring the point she was trying to make.

Katara let her hair down so it would fit better with the outfit. She wondered what her father or Sokka would think if they saw her wearing it. She felt bad for Chopper who was complaining about the perfume smell bothering him. Nami even had to rub it in by spraying more perfume on herself. Sanji had bought the perfume for her, Nami and Vivi.

The remainder of the crew then set out to buy supplies for crossing the desert. They bought several canteens of water, food, shelter supplies, and Nami even bought herself, Vivi, and Katara desert robes to help keep them cooler. They wouldn't change into them until later. Once all the necessary supplies were gathered, Vivi stated that she wanted to travel to a town called Yuba, where she could meet with the leader of the rebels.

As she was explaining, Toph interrupted. "I think I hear and feel a bunch of people chasing someone, and it might be Luffy. It's coming from that way."

Everyone looked in the direction that Toph was pointing.

"Marines!" Usopp was the first to speak. "And that is Luffy! What did he do this time!"

Katara saw Luffy running with a whole group of marines behind him. Suddenly, all the marines fell forward onto their faces.

"That should take care of them for a little bit." Toph said. Katara looked at her and figured she had used her earth bending. When she looked closer to where the marines were, she saw that Toph had made cracks the size of their feet in the ground where they stepped and caused them all to trip.

Katara looked to where Luffy was running and saw another much bigger man catching up to him. The man was not running on the ground, but floating on what looked like a cloud of smoke. She even thought she heard one of the fallen marines call him Captain Smoker. "Um, Toph you didn't get all of them."

Katara thought the bigger marine was going to catch him when she saw his arm separate from his body and fly forword with smoke trailing behind. Initially this made her jump, but then she figured that he had some devil fruit power. Someone else jumped between the two, stopping the smoke arm. Katara thought she heard him and Luffy exchange words but she couldn't make any of them out. She then saw the man's arms turn to fire.

"Hey look! It's the entire straw hat crew!" one of the marines that had fallen pointed.

Katara faced the marines and positioned her arms for water bending, anticipating a fight. She saw the other straw hats also prepare for battle. But Vivi spoke up.

"Everyone run and get back onto the ship!" she ordered looking very scared. "Luffy this way!"

Luffy turned to see his crew and ran towards the direction they were running.

"Get back on the ship?" Usopp repeated as they were running. "Are we leaving?"

"No!" Vivi answered. "We are going up onto the river and into the desert, we only came to Nanohana to get crucial supplies!"

"Do we really have to get back on the boat?" Toph groaned. "And I was finally enjoying myself."

"Do you want to get left behind?" Katara responded to her firmly.

Toph didn't answer.

The crew made it back to the Going Merry and everyone immediately boarded. Vivi gave Carue a different job that required him to deliver a message to her father. Carue sped off with a water canteen strapped to his neck.

"Luffy who was that guy back there? The one that helped you?" Nami asked once the ship had set sail.

Luffy smiled. "He was my older brother, Ace."

"Your brother!" Everyone said at once.

Katara could only imagine what Luffy's brother would be like. She couldn't help but think of him as an exact clone, only a few years older. Luffy explained that even without a devil's fruit, he could never defeat Ace in combat. Many of the other straw hats found that hard to believe. Katara did not know what to think, she had never seen Luffy in battle. Luffy talked more about his brother, sounding very proud and as though they were quite close.

"Ace won every fight we had as kids. But I could defeat him now."

Katara did not have to wait long to see what Ace was like. Within minutes of Luffy explaining about his brother, a man jumped up and landed on the ship's railing, startling her.

"Just who can you defeat?"

"Ace!" Luffy exclaimed happily.

Katara got a better look at Ace and blushed. He sure was cute. It didn't help at all that he was shirtless, and quite well built.

Ace stepped down onto the ship's deck, looked at the crew, and suddenly bowed. "Thank you everyone for taking care of my younger brother!"

Katara was surprised that he would thank everyone for something like that. He sure seemed much more polite and calm than Luffy.

"So Ace, why are you here?" Luffy asked.

Ace looked up at Luffy very confused. "Huh? Didn't you get my message in Drum?"

Luffy shook his head.

"Never mind." He said. "I wanted to invite you to join the White Beard pirates, with your crew of course."

Katara was not sure what the White Beard pirates were or why they would be invited so suddenly to join them.

"No way." Luffy's answer was short.

Ace laughed. "Just thought I'd ask."

"White Beard pirates!" Ussop exclaimed. "So that mark on your back is…"

"Yep," Ace replied, "It's my pride and joy. White Beard is the greatest pirate I've ever known, I want to make him the pirate king and not you Luffy."

"That's fine, I'll just have to kick his ass." Luffy replied laughing.

"I want to give you something Luffy." Ace said and handed him a blank white piece of paper. "Always keep that paper with you, it will let us meet again."

Luffy looked at the paper. Ace could tell that he was a bit confused.

"Do you want it?" He asked laughing.

"Yes I do!" Luffy said defensively.

Ace looked at everyone else in the crew. "Thank you everyone for taking care of my little brother. I'm sure he can be quite a handful." Everyone nodded at that statement. Ace then jumped over the ship's railing and onto his smaller boat before anyone could verbally respond.

"Hey you're leaving already!" Luffy shouted over the rail.

"I'm chasing a man called Blackbeard." Ace explained. "He was part of the Whitebeard pirates but he committed the worst possible crime a pirate can. He killed another crew mate." Ace paused. "I came to finish him off. I wouldn't be in this sea otherwise." He paused. "Luffy, we will meet again at the pirate summit."

Luffy waved as Ace left.

"Your brother seems very nice." Katara commented, wishing that Ace would have stayed a little longer. "And does he have the fire fruit?" Katara thought his ability reminded her of fire bending, but she knew that wasn't very likely. One dead giveaway was that he could turn his entire arms into fire, where as fire benders like Zuko could not.

"Yeah, he told me he had the mera mera fruit." Luffy explained laughing. "I didn't know he had eaten a fruit until today."

"Hey Luffy, what did he give you?" Zoro asked.

Luffy looked at the white piece of paper. "It's just blank paper. But Ace told me to hold on to it so that's what I'm going to do."

"Be careful not to lose it." Nami said sounding concerned.

Luffy's eyes bugged out. "Where should I put it then?"

Katara thought for a moment. "If you want, I could sew it to your hat, that way it will always be with you."

Luffy smiled and handed his hat and paper to Katara. "Sew it in tight!"

After being given a needle and thread by Nami, Katara sewed the piece of paper on the inside of Luffy's hat. She handed the hat back to him when she was finished. "There, it shouldn't fall out."

"Thank you Katara, you're awesome!" Luffy put the hat back on his head.

A/N: Ok I know Ace's part was very brief. That is about how long he was in the manga. I wanted him in the story longer but the desert filler episodes dragged in the anime.

I had trouble remembering exactly what happened when they first dock in Alabasta so I referenced the manga. One chapter Luffy is on the boat, and the next he is running through Alabasta. I'm not sure if the crew docked somewhere secret. The manga jumped around a bit and I almost dug up the anime episode XD. Though I remember the anime having much more content?

And I know Nami was the one to originally sew the paper into the hat, but I thought that was something Katara would likely do.

Cover chapter bonus! Buggy welcomes a new crew mate. Tai Lee!


	7. Crossing The Desert

Katara breathed heavily as she and the other straw hats walked through the desert. She was now wearing proper desert robes, along with Nami and Vivi, much to Sanji's dismay. As awkward as she initially felt in the dancer outfit, she did sort of like wearing it. It was like getting away with something her father and brother would not have approved of. Since coming to this world, she felt that she had a new sense of freedom.

Toph walked next to her and a few steps back. She could hear her friend sighing heavily and she didn't even have to guess why. Toph hated walking on sand, and she described it as making her "sight" fuzzy. At one point, she even walked into Usopp, who had stopped to take a drink of water. As they moved further into the desert, which became very hilly, Toph moved towards Chopper, who was in his reindeer form, and grabbed onto his fur. Katara figured she was using him as a seeing eye animal. She was surprised Toph would even do that. She was not one to ever ask for help even when she needed it. Chopper only looked a little surprised but went along with her.

They walked further and further into the desert. Katara remembered when they had lost Appa and they had to do the same thing back in their world. She only hoped that this was nowhere near as long as that one. She did notice that this desert was not flat like the one in their world. There were many more sand hills that they had to walk over, some seeming to be hundreds of feet high. Katara found herself sinking in some of them.

At one point Toph completely stopped and spoke up. "I think there is an earth quake coming…"

Nami looked at her confused. "But if there was an earth quake we should hear and feel the ground sha-"

She didn't get to finish, not far from them a large creature that looked like a giant lizard, unburied itself from the sand. It looked like it was holding a much smaller creature.

Katara took on a fighting stance but then remembered she was in a desert and did not have easy access to water. She looked around for what she could use to fight. The drinking water was off limits, they needed that for crossing the desert. There was no way that there was enough sweat on her face to use to attack the giant creature.

Luckily her water bending wasn't needed. Luffy, Sanji, and Zoro all stepped up and took down the lizard as if it were nothing. Even Toph stepped up and managed to use the sand to cut at it. The smaller animal the giant lizard was holding on to was freed. Katara took a closer look and saw it was a camel.

"Cool!" Luffy shrieked. "Maybe we can ride it!" He and Usopp stepped forward but the camel pushed them both aside violently. "Stupid camel!" Luffy jumped up and looked as though he were going to attack it.

The camel made some sounds and Chopper stood next to it to translate. "Sorry I only give rides to cute girls."

Luffy looked angry, as did Usopp and Sanji. Each looked as though they were about to give the camel a beating "I'll show you-"

"Who do you think saved your worthless life!" Sanji added.

Nami stepped up quickly and rubbed the camel under the chin. "Aww you poor creature, you must have been so scared! You can travel with us."

To Katara's surprise, the camel's eyes turned to hearts. Nami climbed up onto the camel's saddle, which was still in place. "Katara, Vivi, Toph, come up with me."

Vivi looked very uncomfortable. "It is really fair that only girls get to ride?"

Nami shrugged. "We might as well get some use out of it."

Vivi sighed and climbed up next to Nami. Katara followed. She too felt bad that only girls got to ride but she also didn't want to pass up the opportunity. She justified her decision in her mind by deciding to personally take care of any crew members that passed out from heat exhaustion.

"Toph are you coming up?" Vivi asked. "There is not much room but you could sit on my lap."

Toph shook her head. "No I'd rather walk and know where things are, even if they are a bit fuzzy."

"What are you going to name it?" Chopper asked.

"Idiot." Luffy suggested.

"Moron." Said Sanji.

"Dumb ass." Usopp added.

Nami was quite then smiled. "Nah I'll call him Eyelashes!"

"What kind of a name is that?" Usopp frowned. Katara thought the exact same thing. She looked at the camel and did not think that his eyelashes particularly stood out. The name seemed a bit random.

"That's worse than the other three names." Zoro groaned.

They continued to travel through the desert. Katara was glad that she was at least riding on a camel. At one point, she jumped down after Chopper had collapsed. He had shrunk down to his smaller form right before doing so, and Toph managed to catch him before he hit the ground. After examining him, Katara could only guess that he had heat stroke. She used a little bit of her drinking water along with her healing abilities to help cool him down and stabilize his health.

"I don't think he should walk anymore." Katara said knowing that his normal habitat was cold, much like hers. "Is there any way that someone could carry him?"

Usopp had a wooden board with his things, he explained that it could be used as a weapon. Katara was not sure exactly how. He was also carrying ropes, also another weapon and he attached the ropes to the board. They laid Chopper on it and Zoro dragged him along behind him.

Toph, no longer having Chopper as her guide, moved on to Usopp and grabbed his sleeve.

"Hey Toph what gives?" Usopp asked looking down at the girl.

"Just keep walking Sokka." She responded sounding annoyed.

Sokka? Katara wasn't sure if she misheard her. She hoped that it was only a slip up and that Toph was not being affected by the heat too.

"Hey my name isn't Sokka." Usopp said sounding very confused.

"Just keep going." Toph groaned.

Katara figured that being hot and not being able to see was causing Toph to become agitated. She had rarely spoken. But nobody else was socializing much either.

The day got hotter and hotter. Katara dared not to complain as she was receiving a ride while most of the crew was still walking. Chopper was practically passed out and Toph was hanging her head. Luffy was breathing heavily. Very heavily. Nami even told him several times to stop or he would waste all his energy.

"Hey Usopp, let me have some more water." Luffy breathed heavily.

Usopp's jaw dropped. "Don't tell me you drank all yours already!"

"Luffy we are supposed to be rationing water!" Nami scolded sounding very angry.

"Come on just a little!" Luffy begged holding his canteen towards the huge barrel of water Usopp was carrying on his back.

"No Luffy! It's your fault that you drank all that we gave you!" Usopp argued trying to keep the barrel away from Luffy.

Luffy lunged at the barrel Usopp was holding and managed to get a hold of it. He held it above his head. Sanji intervened first.

"Luffy you moron!" He kicked Luffy in the side which only caused the barrel to fly up into the air, water began spilling out.

"Sanji you idiot!" Nami yelled. "We're going to lose all that water!"

"Sorry Nami-san." Sanji said still with hearts in his eyes.

Katara jumped up, and quickly used her water bending to put all the water back into the barrel before it either dried up or hit the ground. But that still wasn't enough. "Someone catch it!" She ordered.

Usopp ran and managed to catch the barrel just before it smashed onto the ground.

"Nice catch." Katara smiled happy that they did not lose any.

"Katara-chan that was so cool." Sanji cheered with hearts in his eyes. He then hit Luffy over the head. "See what you almost did!"

Zoro smirked. "You're partially at fault too."

"Shut up marimo head!" Sanji yelled getting into Zoro's face.

Vivi spoke up. "Guys! This is no time to fight. We need to save our energy while crossing through the desert. And we have to reach the rest stop before it gets dark."

No one argued further and the group kept walking. Katara sighed and wondered just what kind of a captain she was following. As childlike as Aang was, even he seemed to be more mature than Luffy.

It was evening by the time they finally reached the spot where Vivi wanted to rest. Katara had noticed that it gotten noticeably cooler. The area for the rest stop was on solid rock, which made Toph very happy.

Usopp immediately got to work on making a fire. Katara couldn't help but laugh to herself thinking that Aang or Zuko would have made that so much easier. She then sighed, realizing how much she missed them both, especially Aang. She wondered if he and the others were alright. A thought occurred to her that she and Toph might have been the only ones sent to this world, or worse, the only ones that survived.

It got even colder and Katara felt that it was freezing. Not even the fire was enough to keep her warm.

"I wish we had a tent." Nami sighed. "It's so cold."

"I can make one." Toph smiled putting her hands on the ground. Before anybody could say anything, she had made a rock tent enclosing all the straw hat pirates.

"Toph, you need to put a hole in the top!" Usopp pointed out, knowing that the fire would suck up all the oxygen very quickly and put itself out.

"No problem." Toph replied, putting her hands on the rock tent wall and opened a hole in the top.

"Toph that's so cool!" Chopper said with stars practically in his eyes. Luffy had the exact same look.

Katara was very grateful for the shelter. She felt almost instantly warmer. She eyed Vivi and saw that she looked very uneasy.

"Vivi are you alright?" Katara asked.

Vivi sighed. "We are going to be in Yuba tomorrow, where the rebels are located. I'm just worried that we are too late, or that I won't be able to get their leader to listen."

Katara felt sad. "I'm sure you'll be able to stop them. You did say that the leader was your friend right?"

Vivi swallowed. "Yes but that was many years ago."

"If you were friends once, I'm sure he will listen to you. I don't think you have personally given him any reason to not listen." Katara wasn't exactly sure what to say, and felt that the statement was a little generic.

Vivi smiled though and responded, "Thank you Katara-chan."

Sanji made dinner with some desert animals he and Zoro had caught. They had a contest to see who could catch the largest. Amusingly, their prey was the exact same size, but this did not stop them from arguing over which was larger. After dinner, everyone had gone to bed, exhausted from the day of traveling.

The next morning, Katara was the first to wake up. She had always gotten up early. The fire was very low and the air was still cold. There was natural light coming through the hole in the top of the tent. Katara looked around to see if anyone else was waking.

She noticed that Luffy's arm was off to the side and lying over Chopper's neck. Neither had their blankets covering them. Katara walked over to them both, carefully moved Luffy's arm off Chopper, and gently moved Chopper over just a little. She then covered them with their blankets, figuring they would be cold if they woke up.

It wasn't long before the rest of the crew woke up. Sanji was first, and he immediately went to make breakfast… after flirting a bit with Katara. Katara would have offered to help but she couldn't imagine Sanji's reaction, so she started to pack things up. Everyone was soon awake except for Toph. Katara nudged her several times to wake her. Luffy finally woke her up by pouring water on her face, Nami gave him a smacking after wasting more water.

Katara fixed the problem by bending it back into the canteen before too much of it dried. Nami then assigned her to filling up everyone's canteens for the day. She also put her in charge of the water supply during the day.

"Katara you only filled mine halfway." Luffy pointed to his canteen looking disappointed.

Katara sighed and gently explained. "Luffy, yesterday, you drank your water way too quickly. We need to take smaller drinks so that it will last us until Yuba. I figured that if I only filled yours up halfway you'd drink it slower. When you run out I will give you more." Her face then fell, did she just lecture her captain?

She was waiting for Luffy to argue with her but to her surprise, he had a big grin on his face. "Ok, I'll just ask you for more when I run out."

"I think you missed the point." Nami frowned and hit him over the head.

Soon, they were traveling once again into the desert towards Yuba.

A/N: Next chapter will be a side story about other Avatar characters. I have it half way written.

I was trying to figure out where Katara and Toph would rank among the current SH crew. They are not monster trio level (Luffy, Zoro, Sanji) but definitely stronger than Nami, Usopp, and Chopper. I think Toph could have the potential to be right below monster trio level, but she would have some major limits right now. (Air enemies, islands not made out of earth, being on the ship.) Katara could be a monster on the ocean but even that would have limits. She would have to take into account sea currents and not accidently flip over the Going Merry. Winter islands, she'd be badass. On a desert island, like the one currently, she may have more difficulty. I also don't want to OP her by having her dispatch every devil fruit user by drowning them. It's interesting how situational both their abilities are currently in this world. One almost makes up for the other's weakness. Zuko and Aang would not have that problem. (Zuko can make fire and air is everywhere for Aang, not to mention he can control every element.)


	8. Side Story: Sokka, Suki, and Mai

AN: This is going to be an overview of what happened to three other members of the Avatar world. This will come back later in the story.

_The day of the reunion:_

Sokka opened his eyes after landing on solid ground. The wind was knocked out of him and his vision was a little blurry. He had no idea how he survived because if felt as though he had been falling for a very long time.

He looked at the figure next to him on his right.

"Suki are you ok!" He rolled to his knees and grabbed his girlfriend, his vision returning to normal. "Are you hurt?" When Aang had last used his avatar powers, he remembered grabbing Suki's hand, as well as someone on the other side of him. He did not remember much of what happened after that, except for falling.

Suki's eyes opened. "I'm fine Sokka." She began to cough. "What exactly happened?"

Sokka paused. "I don't know, but we were attacked by someone. Who out there would do that though?"

"I thought we were done with war." Suki said sadly. "And I don't know anyone else out there that would be angry with us."

Sokka then heard someone moving on his other side, and remembered the other person he had held on to. He quickly flipped over. "Hey are you alright." He paused seeing that the other person was Mai. His face dropped at the randomness "oh it's you Mai."

Mai sat up and frowned, "Don't sound so excited."

Sokka's face turned red and he spoke quickly. "Oh it's nothing I just didn't expect you…" He wasn't sure how to talk to Mai. He had barely interacted with her after the war with the fire nation, and during the war, she was always after him and his sister, Aang and Toph. Mai rarely ever talked, or even smiled.

Suki jumped in. "Mai are you alright?" She asked cheerfully. She was a little annoyed at Sokka's rudeness.

"I'm fine." Mai replied. "Any idea where we are?"

Sokka was quiet. "Looks like we're in some kind of field." He squinted. "But I think there is a town up ahead. Maybe we can find more information there."

The three help each other up and made their way towards the town. All were quiet on the journey. Sokka wanted to talk to Suki but he felt weird leaving Mai out of the conversation. But what to say to her? What was he supposed to talk to the future queen of the fire nation about?

"So Mai, how are you and Zuko doing?" Suki finally broke the awkward silence.

"We're doing fine." Mai replied not showing much emotion in her voice. She never looked at Suki to answer the question.

Suki was quiet wondering how to respond. Finally she blurted out "Well me and Sokka and doing fine too!"

"That's good." Mai said.

"You know, she is trying to have a conversation with you." Sokka pointed out.

"Sokka!" Suki blushed becoming angry.

"Oh, what else do you want to know?" Mai asked seeming to be unaffected by Sokka's comment. She finally looked towards Suki.

Suki was quiet and thought of what to say. "Do you like being queen?" Suki then realized that Mai technically a queen. Though she did assume many of the responsibilities a queen would, she and Zuko weren't married yet.

"It's alright." Mai simply responded.

Suki gave up on any conversation at that point. Sokka groaned, thinking he'd almost rather have Zuko's crazy sister Azula with them. At least they could have an interesting, if not scary conversation with her. Sokka also realized that he better not let anything happen to Mai, or Zuko would kill him.

They soon arrived into town, all three of them were in disbelief at what they saw.

"This does not look anything like where we are from." Sokka frowned noticing the architecture, and the clothing people wore.

"Well maybe we should ask someone about this place." Suki suggested looking at Sokka, who immediately took the hint.

Sokka approached the first person he saw. It was a man working at a stand selling various objects. He was currently setting up many of the things he was selling. "Um excuse me, what is this place called."

The man looked at him. "You are on Tahili Island." He replied and went back to what he was doing.

Sokka's face dropped. "I've never heard of this place."

"Yeah, well you probably haven't heard of many places on the Grand Line." The man replied, starting to sound impatient.

"The Grand Line? Where is that?" Sokka asked.

The man looked at Sokka in disbelief. "Where are you kids from! How can you not have heard of the Grand Line!" He exclaimed.

Sokka's face dropped again. There was something very strange going on. "We're not from around here?" He stated and walked away from the stranger back to Suki and Mai. He breathed heavily. "We're either very far away, or Aang tossed us into the spirit world." He said suddenly.

"Is that your only explanation?" Suki frowned. "And I doubt this is the spirit world, if it is, it sure is disappointing." Her stomach suddenly growled. "Can we get some food."

"Sure but let's hope they take our money." Sokka sighed. "Mai, what kind of food do you like? I don't know how good it will be here."

Mai looked at Sokka. "It really doesn't matter, I can eat anything."

"Yeah but I don't think that what they have here will be as good as what you get back home." Sokka pointed out.

"No really, it doesn't matter." Mai was starting to become annoyed.

"But-" Sokka began, he was cut off by Suki.

"Sokka just drop it!"

They walked to what they figured was the nearest restaurant. The three approached a counter.

"What kind of money do you take?" Sokka asked.

"Berries of course." The man at the counter responded. "What did you think we would take."

Sokka's face dropped and Suki spoke up first. "But we don't have any berries!"

"If you don't have berries, you can't eat here." The man responded sympathetically.

"Will this work?" Mai extended her arm forward holding an earring made of gold and rubies.

The man's eyes bugged out and then he laughed. "If you give me that you can have whatever you want!"

Sokka's eyes watered and he looked at Mai. "I am so glad you are with us!" He then looked back at the man. "We'll take three of everything on your menu!"

"Sokka isn't that a bit much?" Suki questioned very nervous.

"Well we're hungry, and we can always take the leftovers with us." Sokka replied. "And we better not waste any of that jewelry Mai handed over."

Soon the three were sitting at a large table, food everywhere. Sokka was busy admiring the scenery around him. The restaurant was full of people and he noticed that many of the women wore very little clothing. Short skirts, low cut tops, open tops, some had on what he didn't know was called a bikini top.

A hand was suddenly placed in front of his eyes. He turned to see that it was Suki's, and she had a very angry expression on her face. Sokka blushed and went to eat his food. Most of it he found to be delicious.

Shortly after, they heard a loud commotion outside followed by people screaming and running. All three ran to see what had happened. They saw a large man with red spiky hair, his hands extended outwards. People were running from him.

"You want to turn me in for my bounty!" He laughed loudly. "You're going to regret that decision!"

Sokka saw that another person, which he assumed was the man who had tried to turn the attacker in, unconscious on the ground next to another building. The wall above him looked as though something had recently been smashed into it. Sokka gulped when he realize that the unconscious man was exactly what had smashed into it. The spiky haired man was followed by a pirate crew. He attacked another fleeing person, by throwing a weapon at her, knocking her to the ground. Sokka was about to turn to run with everyone else, but Suki stepped up.

"Hey what's your problem!" Suki demanded. "These people have done nothing to you!" She took a fighting stance.

Sokka wanted to slap his face. Why was Suki challenging this guy? They didn't need to deal with any trouble.

The man laughed. "You want to fight me little girl?"

Suki did not answer. She tossed her fan at him. To everyone's surprise, he dodged it as though it were nothing. Sokka swore he moved several yards in only a blink of time.

"Is that all you can do!" he laughed louder.

Mai jumped in next. She threw her daggers at the man. Her aim looked perfect. But then something more terrifying happened. He extended one of his hands forword and her daggers slowed down, they turned sideways and continued to travel towards the man where they stuck to his hand.

"There's no way." Mai commented. Sokka looked at her and saw that she genuinely looked scared. Something he had never seen from her.

Then more weapons began to float towards the man, including swords, axes, maces, and even armor. The sword Sokka had with him also flew towards him. He soon had a large arm made entirely out of weapons.

"What is this guy!" Sokka shouted. He wondered if he was some kind of earth bender that was very proficient with metal.

The man lunged towards Suki, but Sokka jumped in front of her. He was beaten to the ground hard with the metal arm.

"Do you want to die too kid?" He growled.

"I don't care! Just let Suki go!" He pleaded. "And Mai!"

"Sokka!" Suki cried getting ready to attack again. Mai stood next to her looking like she was about to do the same.

The man laughed again.

Sokka thought he was going to be dead, when suddenly a large cannon ball hit the aggressor in the head knocking him off his feet.

"The one time I come here to relax, I have to run into trouble." A different larger man said rather sarcastically.

"It's Garp!" one of the attacker's crewmates said, "We have to get out of here!"

The red haired man stood up. "If I take that old man down my bounty will go up even higher."

"Kidd! Don't be stupid! You are not ready to take on Garp! He's the man who caught Gold Roger!" His crewmate argued sounding as though he were about to panick.

One of the other crewmates threw down a smoke screen and once it had cleared, all the pirates had disappeared.

Sokka heard the man step closer to them and begin to laugh. "Just what are you kids doing challenging Captain Kidd? You know he is expected to have a very high bounty in a few months."

Sokka pulled himself up to his knees. His arm hurt badly. "We didn't know who he was." He cringed from pain.

Suki ran and kneeled beside him. "And we couldn't let him hurt those people. Most of them did not do anything to him."

Garp laughed. "Well that's very heroic, but you have to be careful when challenging pirates on the Grand Line."

"Shouldn't you have chased after them?" Mai questioned.

"Well I could have done that but…" He paused and grinned. "I'm on vacation."

Sokka frowned at this. "Why are you still in uniform then?"

Garp ignored the question. "Besides, they are probably long gone by now, there other marines stationed on this island who should take care of them." Garp paused. "Where are you kids from anyway?"

Sokka gulped not sure of what to answer. He was sure that they were in a different world. "We're from… the south."

"You mean the South Blue?" Garp asked.

Sokka's heart began to beat faster. "Yes the South Blue, we're from a… very… cold place."

Suki glared at him, and he knew that she did not think he was very convincing.

"I'm from a hot place." Mai said stoically.

'Mai don't make this any more complicated!' Sokka thought grinding his teeth.

Garp seemed to completely buy the story. His next question did leave Sokka stumped. "Now I'm curious, how did you kids get on the Grand Line?"

Sokka tried to quickly think up a reason. He didn't want to explain to some random stranger that he was not from this world. This guy would probably think he was crazy and toss him into a mental ward.

Mai spoke up. "We were captured by pirates and brought here against our will. Luckily we escaped. Don't ask us who the pirates were because they never gave us their names."

Sokka felt relieved. 'Thank you Mai!' He wanted to hug her at that moment, but even if this Garp guy wasn't there, she'd probably smack him upside the head for doing so.

Garp laughed. "Well even though you were no match for Kidd, I did admire your fighting style. You kids should join the marines. I would train you personally."

Sokka's eyes widened. Marines, most likely the military. They had boats and ways of travel. What better way to be able to search for friends.

"Yes we would like to join!" He exclaimed loudly. "It has always been our dream to join the marines!"

Both Suki and Mai glared at him.

Several days later, the three were on a ship heading towards a training base. During the time before heading off for training, they learned more about the world, including the four oceans, the red line, the grand line, devil fruits, the great pirate era, and the World Government.

"Sokka, why did you have us join the marines?" Suki finally asked sounding very annoyed. "Do you really think we have time for this?"

Sokka smiled. "Well we need to find our friends and family right? And we need a way to travel. Militaries always send their armies all over the world."

"He does have a point." Mai stated. "This will help us find the others. And if we run into anymore people like Kidd, we might not be as lucky next time."

"See Suki, even Mai agrees with me." Sokka said smugly.

"You know, Garp did say that his training is one of the most difficult." Suki pointed out frowning.

"Suki come on, after all we have been through last year, this training will be a piece of cake!" Sokka replied sounding very sure of himself. "And how strong do you think that old man could possibly be?"

Sokka, Suki, and Mai were practically running for their lives as they dodged canonballs that Garp was throwing at them. Sokka found himself knocked of his feet.

"You kids gotta be faster than that if you want to survive the marines!" Garp yelled loudly laughing.

"SOKKA WHAT DID YOU GET US INTO!" Suki screamed dodging another canon. "This man is crazy!"

Sokka got up and continued to run. He was sure that they had in fact died, were sent to the spirit world, and were being punished for some deed that they had done in their previous life. Garp had to be a demon. No man could throw cannon balls and worse, punch them with his bare fists!

"I don't know." Sokka answered her weakly. "But I'd rather face Fire Lord Ozai alone than him."

Sokka couldn't believe how gracefully Mai could dodge the cannonballs, and she didn't seem a bit afraid like him and Suki were.

Soon the three were running laps, doing sit ups, and finally pushups.

"Come on, 100 more!" Garp cheered them on.

"I don't think I can do one more." Sokka whispered. He felt as though he had done over 200.

Suki was struggling with hers but Mai seemed completely unaffected. Sokka was almost jealous of her when she suddenly collapsed onto her stomach.

"Mai are you alright!" Suki shrieked.

Mai breathed heavily. "I can't do anymore! No one can survive this training, we are going to die!"

Sokka's eyes widened. He had never ever seen Mai like this. It almost scared him. "Wow Mai, you're human…"

"Sokka!" Suki scolded. "Mai keep going, we have to get through this." Suki then forced herself to do another push up. "And don't worry; I'll help you kill Sokka after we get out of here."

"Hey I didn't know it was going to be this bad!" Sokka defended himself. "No one from our home is that strong!"

Weeks and weeks passed, and the trio felt themselves getting much stronger. They practiced with weapons, their own and new ones. They learned how to shoot pistols, something Sokka found fascinating. All three sparred with wooden swords and quickly made improvements. None of them ever knew that they could ever be so strong or fast. It almost felt inhuman. The three had also become much closer, especial Sokka and Suki with Mai. Neither had interacted much with her before coming to this world. They even learned how to work with her Mai. Mai slowly opened up to them and became friendlier. The two admired how calm she could be under many circumstances.

Garp finally announced that their training was over and that they had become full fledged marines. "Now I would like you to meet the marines you will be working with." Garp took them into a room located at the marine base. Sokka saw two other marines that looked around their age, one with blond hair, the other with purple. "Meet Koby and Helmeppo."

A/N: Originally it was going to be Sokka, Suki, and Tai-lee, because I wanted to throw in a random third character. But Tai-lee did have a crush on Sokka and I didn't want a love triangle chapter. I realized that Mai being thrown with them would be much more interesting and more unusual. I hope it didn't seem like I was bashing any of the characters because that was not my intent. I'd figured I'd let ever get a chance to see what happened to some of the other Avatar chapters.

For anyone that is not completely caught up to the manga or anime, Kidd is a character that comes into the story during the Sabaody arch. He is one of the 11 supernovas (Pirates with a bounty over 100,000,000) and he was said to be particularly vicious and would cause a huge number of civilian casualties.

AU: When I was writing the last chapter, I wondered how the characters would fit into the world if the Avatar world were just an island on the grand line. This is what I came up with.

The fire nation would rule the entire kingdom, and Fire Lord Ozai would be one of the Celestial Dragons. Zuko and Azula would be next in line to take his place. Zuko would be banished after questioning if their treatment of people "lesser" than them was right.

Iroh would have been the former family head, but he would abandon his post after coming to terms that the privileged lifestyle was wrong. He would join the revolutionary army to help change the world. He would only return when he found out about Zuko's banishment in order to help him. He would also have a huge bounty.

The air benders would from a floating part of the island. They would be extinct and people would doubt that the floating island exists. Aang would be sought out by the world government when rumors come up that the Avatar has reappeared. I'd imagine that Aang's time in limbo would be extended several hundred years, to before the world government came to be, and he'd be in shock at how the world is.

Sokka and Katara's father would be a marine. Sokka would want to join the marines, and either he would or he would be forced to be a pirate. I'd imagine that water bending would be forbidden because several high ranking marines are devil fruit users, and the last thing they'd want is someone who could control water. Katara would run off the be a pirate either to escape the WG or to follow her own dream. I'd imagine that their mother would have been killed by a government official. Katara would hate the current government.

Toph would be from a noble family. Her family would support the WG and the celestial dragons. Toph's story would not change much. She'd sneak away to practice her earth bending and probably run off to be a pirate.

Tai-lee and Mai would also be from noble families.

Aang would be a very useful SH member. He would take on the roll of monk. And along with his elemental powers, he would also be able to provide aerial support. He could be an advanced lookout. If the SH's needed wind, he could provide it and use his water bending to affect the water currents. He and Nami would work well together when fighting. And of course, he would mostly hang around Luffy, Chopper, Usopp, and Brook.


	9. Yuba

The wind was picking up in the desert, sand blowing everywhere. Katara tried her best to look in the opposite direction of the blowing wind because the sand would sting if it hit her face. It was evening and the weather was finally getting cooler. They could now see the town of Yuba up ahead. Vivi looked very relieved, but then her expression turned to worry.

"There is something wrong." She said sounding very uneasy. "A sandstorm is going through Yuba?"

She ran ahead of everyone. The rest of the crew chased after her. Upon arriving into Yuba, she became completely horrified. "What happened here?"

Katara looked and saw that the place was practically deserted. Sand mounds piled against buildings, she couldn't even see the road. Buildings looked like they were falling apart and all the plants looked dead. There was not a single person in sight.

"It looks like no one has been here for a very long time." Sanji stated lighting a cigarette.

Toph spoke up. "Wait, I think there is someone here!" She pointed towards a large hole in the ground.

The straw hats wandered over to the hole and saw a man digging. He didn't even turn to face them when he spoke.

"I'm sorry but the town is all dried up at the moment. If you want an inn for the night, there are plenty to choose from."

Vivi pulled part of her hood over her face. "Um, we heard this is where the rebel army was stationed."

The man suddenly turned around and looked very angry. "What business do you have with them! Are you trying to join!"

"No!" Vivi said quickly, startled by the man's sudden outburst. "Not at all!"

The man calmed down and went back to digging. He explained that sandstorms had been coming to the town of Yuba day after day ravaging the town. The town was no longer a desert oasis, and without the commerce of the city, the rebel army could no longer sustain a base. He then informed them that they headed to another town called Katorea.

"Vivi, where is Katorea?" Luffy asked sounding serious.

Vivi cringed. "It's another town next to Nanohana."

"You mean we have to go all the way back to where we came from!" Chopper exclaimed. Eyelashes made noises next to him. "Eyelashes says that he was in Katorea earlier this week delivering supplies to the rebel army."

Luffy, Sanji, Usopp, and even Toph all jumped on the camel, beating it up. "Why didn't you tell us earlier you stupid camel!" They all yelled.

"So we all came out here for nothing." Zoro commented. Katara could feel his frustration. Crossing the desert had been a pain. She couldn't imagine having to travel through it again.

The man approached the straw hat crew. "Excuse me, but did you call that girl Vivi?"

Katara's heart dropped wondering if this man had any grievances with the king. Would he be their enemy if he knew Vivi was with them? Luffy seemed to think the same thing. His eyes widened and he immediately jumped in front of Vivi panicking. "Old man Vivi is not a princess or anything!"

Zoro hit him over the head. "Don't tell him!"

The man walked slowly towards Vivi. "Vivi, it is you. I am so glad you are still alive." Once he was in front of her he looked into her face. "Vivi, do you recognize me, I will understand if you don't."

Vivi took a close look at the man. "Toto-san!" She shrieked, tears welling up into her eyes.

"Yes you are correct." He confirmed. "Vivi, listen to me, I believe in the king, I do not think a person like him would betray this country. Is that right?"

Katara was surprised that Vivi knew the stranger. She wouldn't have expected her to have time to associate with commoners. She remembered the time she and Toph pretended to be nobles in order to speak with the Earth king. The first thing Toph had told her not to do was talk to commoners.

Vivi now had tears streaming down her face. "No he would never do that!"

Toto fell to his knees, tears streaming down his face too. "I'm so glad." He explained that he tried to stop the rebels many times but none of them would listen to what he had to say. Then he explained that the rebels were prepared to die for their cause.

Vivi looked horrified at the last revelation. Katara felt more concerned for Vivi. She knew from talking to her back on the Going Merry, that she would want to save all the people in her country from the war, even the rebels.

Vivi composed herself and handed one of her handkerchiefs to Toto. "Toto-san, don't worry, I will stop the rebellion." She said this while smiling.

The Straw Hat crew spent the night in an abandoned inn at Yuba. The next morning, they were up very early and ready to cross the desert again. Katara silently hoped that it wouldn't take as long this time, even though it would make no sense for it not to.

Katara had also found out that Luffy had been up most of the night helping Toto dig for water. She thought the gesture was very kind, but hoped that he would be rested up enough to cross the desert.

Toto informed the crew that after Luffy had finally fallen asleep; he had found some water underground. He gathered up some for everyone to have for their trip back across the desert. Before they left Yuba, he wished them all good luck.

Some how, it didn't seem as hot as the previous two days. It was still quite warm, but not completely miserable. Many thoughts passed through Katara's mind. She remembered Vivi telling her about how she met the crew and started traveling with them. It seemed that once it was revealed that she was a princess, Luffy was already set on helping her with her country's problems. Why would he care about things that did not in any way involve him? Especially since they thought that Vivi was an enemy, and even attacked them when they first met? She, Aang, and Sokka were not that kind to Zuko when he finally chose to side with the avatar during the war.

Katara thought more on this and realized that Aang might do something similar in Vivi's case. Vivi wasn't hunting down the Straw Hat crew nor did she ever betray them. They had thought she was the villain from the start. Katara could however imagine that Sokka would probably argue with Aang that they had no time for that kind of stuff.

At some point in their travels, Luffy suddenly sat down, folded his arms, and abruptly said "I quit."

Everyone looked at him wide eyed. Katara had no idea what to think about this turn of events or what exactly he meant by that. Maybe she was right about pirates all along?

"Um Luffy, what do you mean?" Asked Vivi.

Luffy looked up at her. "Vivi, I want to kick Crocodile's ass. What exactly do you want?"

"I just want to stop the rebellion; I don't want anyone to die." Vivi replied.

"You don't want anyone to die?" Luffy repeated sounding very skeptical. "That's naïve."

Vivi's eyes started welling up with tears. She suddenly punched Luffy hard in the face, knocking him to the ground. "What's wrong with not wanting anyone to die?"

To Katara's surprise, Luffy jumped up and hit Vivi back knocking her to the ground. She did not know how to react to his. She looked towards Toph, but Toph didn't seem too concerned. Should she interfere? Some of the other straw hat members seemed to feel the same way.

"Damn it Luffy!" Yelled Sanji.

"Luffy that is going too far!" Usopp cried.

Luffy ignored his other crew mates. "Then why are you risking your life! What is one life going to do!"

Vivi jumped back on top of Luffy and started hitting him in the face. Luffy did not bother to fight back. He simply let Vivi beat on him. "Then what am I supposed to risk! I have nothing else!"

"How about risking our lives too!" Luffy yelled loudly. "We're friends right?"

Vivi suddenly started to cry harder. She buried her face in her hands.

"You're the one who wants to stop him the most." Luffy started. "So tell me where Crocodile is."

Katara was not exactly sure what just happened. Was that fight supposed to make Vivi feel better? Let her know that she has friends by her side no matter what? Let her know that everyone was willing to sacrifice themselves for her? Whatever it was, it seemed to somehow make Vivi happier.

"Crocodile is in a town north of Yuba called Rain Base. He works at a casino called Rain Dinners." Vivi replied.

"Alright!" Luffy raised his arm into the air. "Let's head to Rain Base!"

A/N: I've been reading/watching parts of the Alabasta arc again. It's been forever since I last watched it. This is the part where I remember it dragging a bit, in the anime at least, and I was trying not to make the last two chapters boring. Though I think I'm anticipating Rain Base and the war a little too much. I was wondering how the heck I was supposed to write Katara being present for the Luffy and Vivi fight. I can't imagine her not interfering after Luffy hit Vivi, especially, since she is still adjusting to the crew. I nearly skipped over and just acknowledge that it did happen but I felt it was too important not to.

Let me know if anyone is out of character, both the straw hats and Avatar characters.


	10. Rain Base

AN: So I went to fix some grammar mistakes the other night, and I don't know if I was tired or what, but things got very messed and I was acting like a total noob. Chapter orders were everywhere, chapters got deleted. When it was all said and done, someone pm'd me and kindly pointed out that chapter six and seven were the same. It should be fixed now. If there are any other weird mistakes let me know.

And sorry guys I completely forgot to answer reviews from the last chapter!

Un named: I might do a side story for Tai-lee. I'd have to watch some Avatar again to get a better feel for her character as well as more episodes with Buggy's crew to get a better feel for them. You have also given me an idea for Zhao, but he won't come in till later in the story. I'll give hints about the Ba Sin Sei attack in future chapters; it would ruin parts of the story if I told it outright. And yeah I could see them highly controlling water bending. I could sort of see them giving all water benders an ultimatum, join the marines/WG or go to Impel Down. I could see them worrying about a rogue water bending master being unstoppable because sea stone would do nothing against them, and many of the high ranking marines have devil fruit abilities.

Avatoa: Zuko and Aang will eventually make an appearance, one sooner than later ;) As well as other, more obscure Avatar characters. They won't appear during this arc.

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Traveling through the desert once again, Katara was very happy once she could see the city of Rain Base off into the distance. She was ready to be back in civilization.

"Hey Luffy, give me some of that water, I'm thirsty." Usopp demanded reaching for the canteen around Luffy's neck.

"No." Luffy replied backing away from Usopp. "The sand guy back in Yuba gave this to us after digging all night. I don't want to waste it."

Katara was slightly surprised to hear Luffy say this after what had happened the previous days. Maybe he could restrain himself after all.

Once they were outside the city Katara was amazed. The buildings looked much fancier than the ones in the town of Nanohana, and they were many different colors. The people that she could see looked to be wearing very expensive clothing.

"Alright now we can get more water!" Luffy threw his arms up into the air.

"Yeah more water!" Usopp repeated, mimicking Luffy's motions. The two then ran into the city.

"Wait take some money!" Nami called after them but it was too late. Luffy and Usopp were already out of earshot. "Those guys…"

The rest of the group entered Nanohana and stopped by a fence and a tree near the entrance. They did not want to go in too far, or else Luffy and Usopp might not be able to find them.

"I don't know if Luffy and Usopp were the best people to do that task." Nami said sounding very worried. Katara could understand why she would feel that way.

"Don't worry Nami, it's pretty simple, I don't think even those guys could mess it up." Sanji commented.

"I'll be right back guys; I'm going to go take a leak." Said Chopper and he walked away from the group.

Katara looked at Vivi. "Hey Vivi, this city looks really nice, is it expensive?" she asked.

Vivi smiled. "Yes, Rain Base is one of the wealthier cities in Alabasta. Many people come here on vacation to gamble."

"Everything here looks so pretty." Katara further said.

Katara saw Zoro tapping Eyelashes on the head with a tree branch. The camel looked as though he were becoming annoyed. Toph was sitting on the ground moving her fingers around in a circle in the dirt. Katara figured she was getting bored.

Suddenly she heard a lot of commotion from the direction Luffy and Usopp had run. She looked up to see them both carrying barrels of water, and being chased by marines.

"Everyone run!" Luffy cried.

"Luffy what did you two do!" Sanji yelled, his cigarette fell out of his mouth.

"I should have known something like this would have happened." Nami clenched her teeth. "Trouble is always following Luffy!"

Everyone jumped up, ready to run.

"Wait! Chopper isn't back yet!" Vivi pointed out.

"We have to leave him! We can't stay here!" Zoro exclaimed.

Toph then smiled. "Don't worry, I'll wait for him." And before anyone could protest, Toph used her earth bending to split the ground where she stood, lower herself below ground level, and then brought the ground back together as though it had never been moved.

"Toph wait, you can't…" Katara began but was cut off.

"Katara don't worry she'll be fine!" Zoro yelled. "We have to run!"

Katara felt uneasy about leaving Toph, but she ran anyways. She saw that Smoker, the marine back in Nanohana, was behind the marines chasing them.

"Where are we running to?" Nami asked breathing heavily.

Vivi pointed to a large pyramid shaped building with a crocodile on top. "That is where Crocodile's casino, Rain Dinners, is located! Go there!"

As they ran, Katara saw that they came to a split in the road.

"Since we have so many after us, we should split up." Sanji suggested.

"Good idea." Luffy agreed. He continued to run forward, and jumped on top of the building in front of him. Katara was completely amazed to see that but then realized that she should probably get used to seeing incredible things such as that in this world. She took the path to the right following Nami, Usopp, and Sanji, while Zoro and Vivi ran to the left.

As Katara ran, she heard a popping sound. She turned to see the marines pointing some kind of long cylinder shaped weapons at them. It looked like fire was exploding from their tips and she saw a black smoking object land in front of her.

"What are those things!" Katara asked sweat pouring down her face.

"Guns." Usopp replied, "Don't you have them in your world?"

"No." Katara replied.

"Well don't let the bullets they shoot hit you, some are strong enough to shatter your bones and pierce your heart." Usopp advised.

Katara gulped. "I didn't need to hear that right now."

Sanji suddenly turned to face the marines. "Hey Usopp, make sure neither of those two ladies get hurt. I'll take care of these guys."

Katara wondered if she should stay and help him fight, but then she thought that it might be for the best if she stayed with Nami and Usopp. If they ran into more marines, they might need her help.

The three continued to run and were soon approaching Rain Dinners. Katara saw that the building was surrounded by a moat of water. Nami and Usopp were ahead of her. As they neared the bridge several marines stepped in front of them, aiming their guns. They both stopped cold and threw their hands up in to the air.

"We're dead!" They both cried.

Katara jumped into a stance and started to use her water bending. She pulled out a large amount of water from the moat and slammed it into the marines, sweeping them away. Nami and Usopp turned to face her in shock.

"Katara thank you for saving our lives!" They both said at once bowing.

Katara smiled, knowing that she made the right choice to continue to follow Nami and Usopp.

Zoro finally caught up to them. Katara noticed that he was alone.

"Zoro where is Vivi?" Asked Nami.

Zoro looked around. "You mean she isn't here yet?" He looked very concerned. "She ran ahead of me."

"Maybe she already went inside." Usopp suggested.

"Alright, then let's go in." Nami said and began to move.

Everyone heard a familiar yell from behind. They turned to see Luffy running towards then followed by Smoker. "Run everyone!" He commanded.

Katara turned to follow everyone else. She suddenly thought of something as she was running. Smoker was a devil fruit user and she was on a bridge that was over a moat of water. All she had to do was toss water at him, knock him into the moat and he should sink. It would completely get rid of this problem.

Katara stopped, turned around and began to water bend. Once again, she gathered up a large amount of water and hurled it at the captain. Her aim was nearly perfect. And… he dodged it, easily. He simply floated above the water she had thrown at him as though it were nothing. Katara couldn't believe how fast he was able to move. As he dodged the water, his hand separated from his arm and it was coming after her, very quickly. Her body went cold, there was no way she would dodge his attack and there was no time to use her water bending again.

"Katara hurry!" She heard Luffy's voice and then felt a hand grab the back of her clothing. Soon she felt her felt herself flying backwards. Luffy had used his stretching abilities to save her.

Luffy set her down once his arm had completely retracted and she continued to run with the group. At one point, Zoro almost instantly took out a whole group of marines guarding the entrance to Rain Dinners. Katara had never seen anything like that.

Once they had entered Rain Dinners, Katara was once again amazed at the scenery. The inside looked like something fit for a palace and by the way everyone was dressed, they looked like they all had a lot of money. Katara felt completely out of place standing at the entrance.

"Crocodile!" Luffy yelled loudly. "Come out so I can kick your ass!"

Katara felt uncomfortable as most of the people in Rain Dinners eyed them to see what the commotion was about.

"Crocodile!" Luffy yelled once again.

"Shut up Luffy! Do you really think that is going to make him come out!" Nami yelled and knocked him on the head.

Katara then thought. "Hey do you think Vivi is in here?"

Nami, Luffy, and Usopp's eyes widened.

"Vivi!" They all cried.

"Is that necessary." Zoro face palmed.

Katara heard the door open behind them. "Straw Hat you will not get away this time." It was Smoker. How could they have forgotten about him!

They were all running once again. They neared a door with the words VIP engraved on them. There were several people pointing the way to the door.

"Oh he wants a straight up fight." Zoro grinned.

They burst through the door and saw that the hallway split. There was a sign in the middle that pointed VIP to the left, and pirates to the right.

"Which way do we go!" Luffy asked quickly.

"VIP!" Usopp said. "That is where Crocodile should be."

Luffy looked at him. "But we're pirates, shouldn't we go to where it says pirates?"

"Hmm good point." Usopp agreed.

Katara was not thinking and simply followed Luffy and Usopp to the hallway that pointed for pirates. She saw that it was a dead end.

"There is nothing here." She stated the obvious. As she finished, the floor beneath them opened up and she felt herself falling. She screamed wondering if she was going to smash on to the ground.

Luffy was luckily below everyone as they fell. "Gum Gum…. Fusen!" Luffy cried. His body inflated into a huge ball which everyone landed on, breaking the fall. They still did bounce off and hit the ground, but the impact was greatly reduced.

Katara landed on her right side and only felt a little pain. She sat up and realized that they were in a huge cage. Her face reddened when she realized that they had fallen into a very stupid trap. She also saw that Smoker was in the cage with them.

She noticed that they were in a very large fancy room. There was a desk and a chair with its back turned to them. There was also a beautiful stair case which Katara assumed led to the lobby. The room also had several large windows.

"Well that was pretty clever of him." Said Luffy seriously, holding on to the bars of the cage.

"Yes, no one would have seen that coming." Usopp added.

"No it wasn't!" Nami yelled. "That was exactly what he wanted us to do! And I can't believe you guys fell for it!"

"Nami you did follow us." Usopp pointed out.

Katara noticed Luffy dropping to his knees. "Luffy are you ok?"

"I don't know," Luffy replied. "Suddenly I feel very weak."

Smoker, stood up walked over to Luffy and hit him with his weapon knocking him away from the bars. Luffy landed on his back and smoker drove his weapon into his chest.

"What do you think you are doing!" Usopp yelled.

Zoro stood up looking like he was prepared to fight.

Smoker ignored the others. "Those bars are made out of a rare stone called sea stone, it gives off the same energy as the sea. Touching it will make your body feel as though it is underwater." He paused. "It is basically the sea in solid form."

A voice suddenly laughed. The chair at the desk then turned to face them and Katara saw a man with a scar across his face. He also had a golden hook in place of one of his hands. "That is exactly right, your devil fruit are completely useless in that cage."

"So you are behind all this Crocodile." Smoker said coldly.

Katara felt her insides drop as she looked at the man who was responsible for all the trouble in Vivi's country.

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Toph sat underground waiting for Chopper to return. When she finally felt his footsteps against the earth approach the area where the group originally gathered, she began to resurface.

"Where is everyone?" He asked sounding very confused.

Toph suddenly burst out of the ground completely startling Chopper.

"Monster!" He cried and immediately went to hide behind a tree, but did it on the wrong side. It didn't matter at all to Toph though.

"The marines came and everyone had to run." She explained, ignoring the fact that she had scared him. "I stayed to wait for you."

"Oh Toph, it's only you." Chopper said sounding very relieved but still shaking. "Do you know where they went?"

Toph thought for a moment. "Not exactly, but I bet they went to that Rain Dinners place. You're going to have to be the one to find it." She waved her hand in front of her face.

"Alright, let's go then!" Chopper replied sounding very determined.

The two began to walk through the city.

"Do you have any idea which building it could be?" Chopper asked.

"I really don't know, they are all the same to me." Toph responded. "It could have Rain Dinners Casino written on the front and I wouldn't know it."

"That's right, writing would be meaningless for you." Chopper said his voice sounding like he had come to a realization.

"Yep it is." Toph responded. "It's alright, I don't think I'd like reading anyway. It sounds boring."

Chopper was quiet and Toph was wondering if he was trying to change the subject. "The buildings here look very neat." He said suddenly.

Toph smiled mischievously. "I'm glad to know that."

"Oh I'm so sorry! I forgot!" Chopper apologized quickly. Toph felt his heart rate increase.

"Oh don't worry, I do think they feel very neat." Toph replied hoping to calm him down. It worked and she felt his heart beat slower.

They continued to walk. Toph couldn't be too much help in finding Rain Dinners. She figured that if she were alone, she would have to poke her head into every door and ask if she was at the right place. She might be able to ask someone to get general directions but she would still need some help along the way to find the correct building.

"Hey Toph, what do you like to do for fun? You always seem bored on the Merry." Chopper asked.

"Well, I like to earth bend." Toph responded. "Back at home, my parents were very rich, and well there isn't much to do when your parents are nobles. They always wanted me to do relaxation exercises, and those were boring. They also wanted to shelter me from everything." Toph was quiet and then said very proudly, "I used to sneak out and participate in earth bending tournaments, and I was the champion."

"Champion!" Chopper sounded amazed. If Toph was not blind, she would have seen the stars in his eyes. "That sounds amazing!"

"Yeah." Toph smiled. "I had to learn earth bending on my own, well I learned it from badger moles I guess, but I never had a human master."

"Badger moles?" Chopper repeated. "You learned it from an animal."

"They were the original earth benders." Toph said. "But back to your other question, I do like talking to people too, as long as they are not boring. And I like teasing my friend Sokka because it is pretty easy to do. I also like listening to music and stories, as long as they are not boring. I hate when people describe what everything looks like when they tell a story."

"Luffy does want a musician on the crew." Chopper informed.

"I hope we get one soon; that would make riding on the Merry more fun." Toph replied.

They entered an alley and Chopper suddenly pushed Toph behind a garbage can. He pushed himself up against it to hide as well, only he was on the wrong side and completely in sight of anyone that would be in the alley.

"That woman is a marine!" Chopper said quickly.

Toph knew there was someone ahead of them. She was also very concerned about Chopper's ability to hide. "Um Chopper, I know I'm the blind one here, but won't she still see you?"

Toph felt him jump at the realization. The woman was already walking towards them and she tripped over Chopper, causing them both to fall to the ground. Toph felt something fall off from in front of the woman's eyes and land on Chopper.

"Oh no, my glasses." She said. Toph could feel her searching for them. "I can't see without them."

Toph heard Sanji's footsteps approaching them. She then felt him step off to the side out of sight of the woman. She grabbed the object that she figured were the glasses off of Choppers face and handed them to the marine. "Is this what you are looking for?"

The woman grabbed them and put them back on. "Oh thank you! I'm practically blind without them!"

"Yeah, I'm blind all the time." Toph replied dryly.

"Oh I'm so sorry about that!" The woman apologized and Toph could tell by her heartbeat that she was a little embarrassed.

"It's not so bad."

"Who is that next to you? Is it a friend?" The woman asked meaning Chopper.

"He is my seeing eye animal." Toph lied. "And we have to leave now."

Toph pulled Chopper up to his feet. She grabbed his antler, to keep up the act.

"Ok bye." The woman said.

"See ya later." Toph replied. She then, ironically, led Chopper to where Sanji was around the corner.

"Geez did you have to talk to her for so long?" Sanji asked lighting a cigarette.

"I don't know, she seemed nice." Toph replied shrugging it off.

"She works under Smoker." Sanji explained. "That stupid swordsman has something against her."

"I think she's too clumsy to be a marine." Toph stated abruptly.

"Yes she is very ditzy." Chopper commented.

"Well let's go meet up with the others." Sanji decided and led the two younger Straw Hats to Rain Dinners.

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"Imitating… Sanji." Luffy said. He made a face similar to what Sanji would make. He also held up his hand as though he were holding a cigarette. "Hey, which one of you dumbasses ate all the meat." Luffy said mimicking him.

Usopp cracked up laughing.

"Can't you guys take this situation seriously!" Nami yelled stomping her left foot.

"We can't get out and I was getting bored." Luffy tried to explain himself.

Katara had her back turned to Nami. She was scared at what could possibly happen to everyone, but she couldn't help but giggle at Luffy's impersonation. Somehow it broke the tension she was feeling. However, the last thing she wanted was for Nami to find out that she found it amusing. Nami could be very scary when she was angry.

"And why are you sleeping!" Nami knocked Zoro in the head.

"Is it morning yet?" Zoro asked rubbing his eyes.

"It's been morning!" Nami yelled once again. "At least Katara can act normal in a situation like this!"

Katara's face dropped and she suddenly stopped giggling. She quickly put on a very serious face, turned around and said "Yes I am being very serious."

Nami frowned. "Why do I get the feeling you were secretly laughing too."

The look on Nami's face was terrifying and Katara backed up, her face turning slightly blue.

"You are quite a commanding young woman." Crocodile said from his seat.

Nami eyed crocodile and smiled. "Once these guys get out of this cage, they'll knock you above the clouds…. Isn't that right Luffy?"

Luffy threw his arms into the air. "Yeah to the clouds!" He then put his hands onto the bars of the cage, and sank right to the knees. Katara sighed realizing how pathetic that had looked. Though now she was curious, Nami sure did place a lot of trust in Luffy. And she seemed quite confident that they would get out. But, she thought, Sanji, Toph, Chopper, and Vivi still had not been captured, so maybe there was hope.

Almost on cue, she heard Vivi's voice. "Crocodile!" Katara turned to see her standing at the top of the steps. A woman wearing a very small outfit, covered by a fur coat stood behind her.

She looked at Nami. "Who is that with Vivi?"

Nami swallowed. "That is Miss All Sunday, Crocodile's partner."

Katara had remembered Miss All Sunday being mentioned when Vivi described the structure of Baroque Works. She also remembered Nami telling her that the rest of the crew, minus Chopper, had already met her while they were leaving an island called Whisky Peak.

"Welcome Princess Vivi, no Miss Wednesday." Crocodile greeted very calmly. "I am impressed that you managed to dodge all my assassins on the way here and that you even came at all."

"Oh course I'd come! I want to see you dead!" Vivi threatened. Katara noticed that she was starting to become very angry.

Crocodile laughed coldly. "The only thing that is going to die is your worthless country."

Vivi started to fume. Taking out her weapon, a whip chain, she charged at Crocodile. "If you weren't here, Alabasta would be at peace!" She roared and whipped her weapon at Crocodile's head. Crocodile made no effort to dodge. Katara was shocked that once her weapon had come into contact with him, his head… exploded? Katara had to look closer because she had thought that Vivi had knocked his head off. All she could see was sand all over the ground. Had that been there the entire time? Was it really that easy? Had Vivi killed him?

"That's useless." Smoker stated. Katara jumped, almost forgetting he was there.

She soon saw what Smoker meant, the sand on the floor started to lift off the ground and fly behind Vivi. The rest of Crocodile's body materialized into sand and followed. Crocodile's body materialize out of the sand that was floating behind Vivi, his arm around the upper half of her body.

"Miss Wednesday, you should know about my suna suna fruit power." He paused and then said very coldly. "Shall I turn you into a mummy?"

Vivi closed her eyes, anticipating the worst and Luffy and Usopp began to shout from behind the bars of the cage.

"A sand man!" Shouted Usopp.

"Let go of Vivi or I'll kill you!" Luffy yelled.

Katara felt completely helpless, her water canteen was empty. The only water nearby was behind the glass on the walls. Blood bending was out, it wasn't a full moon. That was a technique she felt was unethical anyway. She had nothing to fight with.

Surprisingly, Crocodile threw Vivi to the ground. "Sit there," He ordered. "It's time for our plan to be set in motion."

"You right." Katara looked to see Miss All Sunday smiling. "It is 7 o'clock, time for Utopia to begin."

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A/N: Wow long chapter. It was originally going to be longer but I decided to split it up.

Ah yes, I don't want to make Katara's water bending an "I win" button, or that would make all her fights boring. It would be like if every big fight Robin was in, she would just use her devil fruit ability to break everyone's spine. (Probably why she usually fights enemies who are too large to do that ex: Hama, or else to take out fodder marines) I also want to give her room to improve and become more skilled, like the other straw hats. That's why she completely missed Smoker on the bridge.


	11. Escape

Katara could feel herself becoming very angry. Crocodile had just explained his plan to everyone. She couldn't believe that one person could just build their own army and take over a country like he did.

Vivi had her hands tied behind her back. "I won't let you do this!" She cried. "We can still make it to Alburna if we just keep heading east! Then we can stop the rebellion!"

Crocodile looked at her and grinned. "Alburna? We were just heading there now. You are quite welcome to come along." He then reached into his coat and pulled out a key that Katara figured would unlock the cage. "But I think this is what you want. What will it be, your country or those five pirates?"

Luffy reached through the bars of the cage. "Give that here!"

There were more tears streaming down Vivi's face "I'll save them both."

Crocodile laughed and tossed the key to the floor. Vivi, using all her strength managed to break the bindings on her hands. She dove after the key desperately trying to reach it. The ground below the key suddenly opened up, and the key fell into a room below before Vivi could grab it.

"What a shame." Crocodile began. "That key fell down into the bananadile lair. You can still go down there and get it if you want. But I should let you know, bananadiles prey on even the sea kings."

Bananadile? Katara's eyebrows rose. She suddenly noticed that outside of Crocodile's windows, was water. The moat must surround this room. Inside the water, she saw giant crocodiles with bananas on their heads.

"Wow those bananas have crocodiles growing out of them!" Luffy shouted in amazement.

"No Luffy, it's the other way around." Usopp corrected. "The bananas are growing out of the crocodiles."

"I have no more need for this place." Crocodile said coldly. "Soon, the water from outside will flood the bananadile lair below and then flood this room. But it is now time that Miss All Sunday and I left." He and Miss All Sunday began to walk towards the exit, leaving Vivi on the ground crying.

Katara thought about the situation. Water was going to flow in? That was perfect; she could use it as a weapon. If she could gather up enough and submerge crocodile and Miss All Sunday, she could stop them easily, as long as they couldn't dodge as well as Smoker. Her head suddenly sunk when she realized that by the time enough water had flowed into the room, Crocodile and Miss All Sunday would be long gone. She sighed and sunk to her knees.

A horrifying thought came over her. Water was her element, the one she had worked so hard to master, and it was going to kill her. Sure she could bend it away from her and the others, but for how long? It wouldn't take long for her to become exhausted and lose focus, especially with the amount of water that would be entering the room. Could she freeze it? No, with how hot it was outside, the water was probably very warm and the ice wouldn't stay frozen for long. She would also only be able to freeze the water that she could see, and water would continue to flow up. If she had too much frozen, the room would become very cold and everyone could freeze to death. If she froze the water over the opening, the pressure from the water flowing in from below would only break the ice. Despite everything, she figured she might as well try it.

Vivi screamed and Katara lifted her head. Vivi was looking down into the room below. "The bananadile just ate the key!"

Katara's heart dropped. Getting that key might have been their last hope, unless Sanji, Chopper, or Toph had another idea.

"Vivi kick that Banadile's ass and get the key back!" Luffy shouted.

Katara wondered if that were even possible. The crocodiles were huge, how could any person just take them on without some kind of special ability or weapon?

Crocodile, who was not gone yet, stopped walking and spoke. "So what will it be Miss Wednesday? One million civilians, for five measly pirates with no future? It's your choice."

Vivi's head dropped and the tears started up again.

"Even a princess is powerless in these circumstances." Said Miss All Sunday.

"Yes taking over this country was too easy." Crocodile stated. "It is full of idiots. Especially those rebels and a certain man digging holes in the town of Yuba."

Luffy suddenly jumped up. "What did you say!"

Crocodile grinned. "You know who I'm talking about? That stupid old man keeps trying to dig up an Oasis that dried up years ago. But it's pointless."

"What do you mean?" Luffy demanded sounding very angry.

"Think about it Straw Hat, do you really think a sandstorm can attack a town successfully so many times?" Crocodile continued to grin and Katara knew what was happening.

She was angry. On all her travels with Aang, she did not think she had ever met anyone as cruel as this man. Maybe fire lord Ozai, but she had never actually met him. Perhaps even Azula. She wondered if Azula could have come up with and executed a plan this perfectly. Then a horrifying thought came over her, Azula probably could have, but because she already had power, she would never have needed to.

Katara then heard a strange noise that sounding like someone was talking gibberish. She looked towards Crocodile and Miss All Sunday, who were once again walking towards the exit. Miss All Sunday pulled out what looked like a snail from her coat.

"Hello, is this the millions report?" She spoke into it. Katara wondered what the heck was going on.

"Hello, Hello? Does this thing work." A voice that sounded like Sanji spoke. "Can you hear me?"

Katara's hopes lifted. Was that really Sanji? How was he talking through the snail? How did that work? Were the others on their way? Maybe she wouldn't die in this cage.

"Yes I can hear you." Miss All Sunday replied sounding a bit impatient.

"I've never used one of these baby snail phones before. Is it getting through?" Sanji's voice continued.

Crocodile grabbed the baby snail out of Miss All Sunday's hand. "Spit it out already, what happened?"

There was a noticeable pause. "Oh I've heard that voice before." Sanji's voice suddenly became a little lower. "Welcome sir to the crappy restaurant."

"Crappy restaurant!" Crocodile yelled angrily into the snail.

"Good I'm glad you remembered." Sanji's voice said coldly.

Luffy suddenly spoke. "Crappy restaurant! That sounds like Sa-"

Usopp suddenly covered his mouth. "Wait Luffy! Maybe he doesn't know about him yet!"

Katara then remembered back to Mr. 2. He had duplicated everyone's face, except for Sanji, who was in the kitchen. Crocodile wouldn't know about him.

"Who the hell are you!" Crocodile yelled coldly into the snail.

"Me, I am…. Mr. Prince." Sanji's voice said.

Katara noticed that Miss All Sunday seemed to be amused by the entire thing. She laughed quietly as Sanji had introduced himself.

"I see, Mr. Prince." Crocodile said. "Just where are you?"

"I can't tell you." Sanji replied. "If I do, you'll come kill me." Sanji then added. "I give out a lot of info pretty easily, but unlike you Mr. 0, I am not an idiot."

Katara couldn't help but giggle.

"Mr. Prince save us!" Usopp suddenly started to yell. "We don't have much time left!"

"Mr. Prince!" Luffy simply yelled.

Sanji could be heard laughing. "That sounds like my crew. I'll be there sho-" There was suddenly a loud blast and Sanji went quiet.

Katara felt herself go cold again. Everyone else seemed to cry out in horror, save for Zoro and Smoker. Zoro did, however, look very angry and a bit worried. Sanji was their last hope. Katara wondered about Toph and Chopper. She wasn't sure if there was anything in the room Toph could earth bend. The floor did not seem to be made out of stone but of a material she had never seen before. Could Chopper do anything? Come to think of it, what was Sanji supposed to do?

"That son of a bitch better still be alive." Zoro said with anger in his voice.

Another unfamiliar voice was heard laughing through the snail. "What should we do with this guy?"

Crocodile spoke to the new voice. "Where are you at? Tell me right now!"

"Yes sir," Said the voice, "we are right in front of Rain Dinners."

"I will be right there." Crocodile informed and he and Miss All Sunday finally left.

"Oh no the water is starting to come into this room!" Nami pointed to where the floor had opened up.

Katara looked to see the water rising from the floor below. She silently cursed to herself, Crocodile just had to leave before that had happened. A bananadile also crawled out of the floor.

"Vivi kick its ass!" Luffy yelled once again. Vivi only looked horrified.

"Katara you're a water bender!" Usopp shouted suddenly having an idea come to him. "The cage is made out of sea stone, which Smoker said was just the sea in solid form. Can you bend it?"

Katara's eyes widened wondering why she didn't think of that. "I'll try." She jumped into a stance used for water bending and quickly went through a water bending motions with her arms. The sea stone didn't budge. She tried it again. Still nothing. She tried one last time, nothing. She figured that she probably looked pretty silly. "It's no good, my element flows, I've never even tried to bend anything solid." She wondered if a technique existed that would allow her to bend solid water. Katara shook her head realizing how stupid that would sound in her world. She suddenly thought about ice and how it was solid water, but then realized that it was very brittle and could be broken easily. This stuff was denser than anything she had ever seen in her world.

"So you're a water bender?" Smoker said sounding slightly interested. "I've only heard about them in tales. They were said to be warriors of legend that died out centuries ago before the devil fruits were ever discovered."

Katara was now interested. "So there were benders in this world?"

"No one knows for sure." Smoker replied. "But even still, if you truly are water bender, the government will be very interested in you." He paused. "Of all the elements, water bending is the most forbidden. The only thing that would interest the Government more as far as elemental bending goes, is if you were the avatar." He eyed her coldly.

"I am not the avatar!" Katara shouted almost a little offended.

"Doesn't matter, the avatar was said to have died out with the benders." Smoker spoke. His voice suddenly became cold again. "However, all marine officers are ordered to kill any rogue benders we come across."

Nami and Usopp screamed, Zoro grabbed his swords and Luffy jumped in front of Katara. "You will not hurt Katara!" Luffy shouted raising both arms in the air. "She's our nakama!"

Katara was scared. If they ever got out of the cage alive, the government would know of her existence. This was not a good world for Aang to send them to. She worried that he might have already been caught by the marines. Hopefully he was with Sokka, or Zuko, or even Iroh. She prayed that he wasn't alone.

Smoker seemed to calm down. "I am not interested in hunting down any elemental benders." He said casually. "I am only interested in catching you, Straw Hat." He pointed to Luffy.

Katara felt a little relieved but still worried because this guy could still notify his superiors that she was a water bender. She also wondered why he wouldn't catch her. The military was supposed to follow their superiors' orders right?

Another thought had occurred to Katara. Smoker had mentioned that the avatar was said to have died out centuries ago, if it existed at all. Something similar happened in her world, but then she and her brother discovered Aang frozen in the South Pole. Maybe this world still had an avatar. She thought that if they had found this world's avatar and Aang, then this world would have two avatars. She also thought that if Aang hadn't sent anyone else to this world other than those who were at the party in Ba Sin Sei, then maybe she was this world's last water bender?

A loud roar suddenly interrupted her thoughts and she saw that Vivi was really struggling against the bananadile. The animal had bit the stair case completely destroying it! Katara couldn't believe how much power the animal had. Katara jumped into another water bending stance. "Vivi, I'm going to help you!" The windows had shattered when the bananadile had bit the stairs and the room was beginning to fill with water much faster. She would have plenty to help her fight.

"This place will be flooded in less than twenty minutes!" Usopp cried.

Katara couldn't think about that, she had to help Vivi first. Going through her water bending motions again, she gathered up a large amount of water and rushed it at the bananadile. It was enough to knock it off its feet and on to its back. Its head slammed against what remained of the stairs.

"Nice one Katara!" Luffy cheered.

"Thanks Katara!" Vivi shouted smiling and she began to run up the bananadile as though it were a ramp. "I'm going to get help!" She informed when she reached the top of the stairs. "I'll be back soon!" Vivi ran out to the main lobby of the casino.

Katara knew there was one more thing she had to try. The water was filling in quickly and she had to somehow slow it down.

"Hey guys, I'm not sure how well this is going to work, or how long I can keep it up." Katara started. Everyone's attention was now focused on her. Katara did not say anything more. She threw her arms up and forward, towards the broken windows where the water was rushing in. She managed to freeze a layer of water right at the entrance of each of the windows. She held her pose to keep the water frozen. She could often feel parts of the ice breaking and water leaking through, but she would freeze it over again. The water still flowed in from the middle of the floor, but at least she had slowed down the rate that the room would completely flood. She would have to trust that Vivi would find some help outside soon. The only thing she could do to help her friend was to buy her time.

"I am so glad we found you in the ocean!" Usopp said almost in comical tears to Katara.

"Yay Katara!" Luffy cheered.

"Thank God, I thought we were done for when those windows broke." Nami added sounding somewhat relieved.

Katara couldn't pay much attention to them. She had to concentrate on holding back the water flowing into the room. Her arms were already starting to hurt from holding them up.

"I hope she doesn't get too exhausted." Zoro pointed out exactly what Katara was afraid would happen.

"We have to support our friend Usopp." Luffy informed.

"Yes, Katara needs encouragement." Usopp agreed.

Katara tried to drown them out as she was worried about breaking her concentration.

"Katara! Katara! Katara! Katara!" They both cheered. Strangely enough, their cheering did make her feel more determined and less fatigued.

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Toph breathed and quickly took out the last Baroque Works agent standing outside of Rain Dinners. She, Chopper, and Sanji had just fought several of them. Sanji even took something off one of the agents and somehow contacted Crocodile. He also made it sound like an agent had killed him so that Crocodile would not think that anyone was coming to help their friends.

"Alright, Toph climb onto Chopper's shoulders." Sanji instructed. It was time for the next part of their plan. "More agents are already starting to gather in front of Rain Dinners."

Toph climbed up on top of Chopper. He soon grew to his larger human form. Sanji threw his desert robes over them. "When you hear that Mr. Zero bastard come out, you know what to do."

They both nodded and Sanji left them to get inside of Rain Dinners.

Chopper attacked several more Baroque Works agents. Toph groaned wanting to fight, but they didn't want Crocodile to think that there were more Straw Hat pirates to worry about.

"Who is that guy!" One of the agents yelled.

Chopper took a deep breath and then yelled loudly "I AM MR. PRINCE!"

It wasn't long after Chopper's announcement that Toph heard someone demanding angrily to know what happened to Mr. Prince. Toph assumed it was Crocodile talking to one of the agents.

"I think that's him!" Chopper said frantically.

"Then go!" Toph ordered. "And make sure he sees you!" She was slightly nervous herself, but she would dare not show it in her voice.

Chopper started to run forward and Toph heard a voice yell, "There is Mr. Prince!" Chopper suddenly ran faster, Toph did not like the ride at all. She felt herself bouncing and the motion did not agree with her stomach.

"You know, this would work better if I were the one running!" Toph commented, she was starting to feel sick.

Chopper ignored her and said "This should be far enough!" He made himself smaller. Toph felt herself rushing towards the ground, she did not like the sensation she felt at all.

She climbed off of Chopper's shoulders and quickly used her earth bending to do the same trick she had used when they first entered Rain Base, only this time, she took Chopper with her.

She heard Mr. Zero's voice above them as well as a woman's. "I will kill that Mr. Prince." He said coldly. Toph wanted so badly to use her earth bending against him figuring he would never find her underground. But Sanji had told both her and Chopper to absolutely not engage him in battle.

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Katara continued to concentrate, doing her best to ignore the fatigue. She was feeling weaker and weaker, her arms were now trembling. Everything she saw in front of her seemed to play out in single frames and she did her best to only hear the sound of the water, blocking out everything else that would be distracting. She saw Sanji and Vivi enter out of the corner of her eye, and she also barely saw Sanji take out the bananadile with one kick. She tried her hardest not to be too impressed, or else she would break concentration. She heard Sanji and Nami talk, but she was too busy concentrating to make out what they were saying. She heard smoker talk and say something about Miss All Sunday and how she has had a huge bounty since she was eight years old. She saw more bananadiles enter. Smoker pointed out which one had the key. Her entire body began to shake. "Come on, just a little longer." She encouraged herself. "Absolutely nothing in here is interesting." A large white orb came out of one of the bananadile's mouth. A man came out of the orb. That was odd but she couldn't think about that right now. "It's not at all interesting." She thought once again. Her face was getting hot and she was sweating. Her mouth was dry and she wanted a drink. It almost seemed cruel that the room was flooding with water that she couldn't have and it was now up to her knees. There was more talking, but she had to continue to block it out. She couldn't afford to be distracted. All she could think was 'freeze, freeze, freeze' it had become a mantra to her. Her lungs started to burn and tears were streaming down her face. She barely saw Sanji using the stranger to somehow open the cage. Her crew mates began to rush out of the cage. Her vision blurred and her arms were finally giving out.

"I'm sorry guys!" She cried and collapsed to her knees. She heard a loud crashing sound of the ice breaking and water rushing in. She was so exhausted that she wanted to pass out right there. But she had to move. She tried to get up but her legs refused.

"KATARA!" she heard Luffy practically scream.

Katara felt someone grab her, she assumed it was Luffy, and she felt herself flying forward out of the cage. But Luffy couldn't swim, and this water would be over their heads soon. Katara knew she did not have the strength or energy to swim. The water was not over her head and she felt herself being pulled away. The room was completely flooded.

Someone grabbed her around her rib cage and she could feel herself being pulled forward and up. Someone had saved her, but who? She was too weak to look up to see who it was.

She soon felt herself bursting out of the water and she breathed heavily. Katara knew by looking at the surroundings, that they were in the moat that encircled Rain Dinners. She also saw that it was now evening and that the sky was completely orange.

"Luffy are you alive." It was Sanji's voice to her right. Sanji was holding Luffy in one arm, and grasped the edge of the moat with the other. Sanji looked towards Katara."Ah! Why did I have to grab Luffy when I could have saved Katara-chan!"

"Long Nose please wake up!" Vivi cried to her left. Like Sanji, she was holding on to the edge of the moat with one arm and holding Usopp by the nose. Katara wondered if that would be painful and what had happened to make Usopp unconscious.

"That was a close one." Said Nami's voice directly behind her. She was the one who had saved Katara. Katara did not expect that at all, she figured it would have been one of the guys.

Sanji placed Luffy's body on the edge, climbed out, and then helped Vivi pull Usopp onto shore. He then helped pull Katara out of the water, he had hearts in his eyes as he did. He helped out Nami and Vivi next.

"I'm always happy to help the ladies!" He said happily. Katara wondered if she would ever have a normal conversation with him.

"Thanks for saving me Nami." Katara said out of breath.

Nami eyed her. "I should be the one thanking you." She said in disbelief. "If you hadn't used your water bending to hold that water back, we all would have drowned.

Katara simply smiled. She suddenly wondered where Zoro was and if he had made it out.

Just as that thought occurred to her, Zoro suddenly burst out of the water… holding on to Smoker. Katara wondered just why he would save the marine that was trying to capture them previously. She felt a little bad, but she had silently had hoped that he had drowned so that he wouldn't be able to report her water bending to the marines.

"Stupid swordsman! Why did you save Captain Smoker!" Sanji yelled feeling the same way as Katara.

"Shut up love cook! It wasn't like I wanted to!" Zoro shot back. He threw Smoker up onto land and then climbed out himself.

"Who would have thought that having devil fruit users would be so pesky." Sanji laughed and then looked towards Nami. "Hey Nami, do you still have that perfume I gave you in Nanohana?"

"You mean this?" Nami pulled the perfume out of her robes and then sprayed some on her.

Sanji's eyes turned to hearts. "You do still have it!"

Katara frowned. Was that all he wanted? She then wondered where Toph and Chopper were and if they were alright.

Smoker then swung his weapon at Zoro, which was immediately blocked with Zoro's sword.

"Roronoa Zoro, why did you save me?" Smoker demanded coldly. He almost seemed offended that he was saved by pirates.

Zoro smirked. "I was just following my captain's order."

Luffy and Usopp then awoke at the same time, almost as if on cue. They both jumped up.

"Alright I shall lead everyone to Alburna!" Usopp shouted as though he were the captain.

"To Alburna!" Luffy shouted. He then eyed Smoker. "Ah the marines are here!"

Katara sighed. Didn't Zoro just say that Luffy ordered him to save Smoker? Luffy sure was one of the oddest people she had ever met. But then she remembered back in the cage, 'You will not hurt Katara! She is our nakama!' and she couldn't help but smile.

"Just this once, I will let you and your crew go." Smoker coldly said to Luffy. "However, next time we meet, you will be dead." He then looked at Katara. "Water bender, as a favor to you, I will not report you to headquarters."

Katara was very surprised at both things Smoker had said. Were people in the military allowed to do whatever they wanted in this world? Katara then heard voices nearby.

"It's the Straw Hats with Smoker!"

"Let's go back him up!"

She saw that it was the marines. She assumed that they were probably Smoker's inferiors.

"Looks like it's time to leave." Zoro said sounding annoyed.

Everyone began to stand up. Katara still felt out of breath, but she now had the strength to stand and run. She and the other Straw Hats began to run, except for Luffy and Zoro. Katara looked and thought that they might have been saying a few more words to Smoker.

"Where are Chopper and Toph?" Katara asked suddenly remembering them.

Sanji grinned. "Don't worry, they doing something very important for us."

Katara wondered what exactly what that was and continued to run.

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A/N: Ok I am very glad that I split this chapter and the last, otherwise the chapter would have been very long.

I always thought, during the anime, that Crocodile's room flooded WAY too slowly, but then I have to remember shonen time, where five minutes can span 20 episodes. I sort of used Katara to remedy that pet peeve of mine in this story. Also, Crocodile and Robin walk very slowly. When I watched the anime the other day, I was a little amused at how long it took them to leave the room.

Not explained here, but Usopp was knocked unconscious underwater by a rock in the story. Originally Vivi and Nami both saved him, but I needed someone to help out Katara. Sanji had Luffy (he is the one who usually saves Luffy from the water) and Zoro was helping Smoker. So I used Nami.

And sorry if the part where Sanji and Vivi enter Crocodile's room was a little weird. I figured that from Katara's point of view, that she would be in a very deep concentration and would not be completely aware of what exactly was happening. But a lot of strange things happened, Sanji taking down the bananadile with one kick, Mr. 3 suddenly appearing in the candle orb, Luffy and Zoro taking down the rest of the bananadiles, that Katara would have to notice and react somewhat.

I might be editing previous for grammar mistakes soon. So sorry if get a ton of e-mail updates for new chapters if you are subscribed to the story.

And finally, I know that the animals in Avatar are often a combination of two or more. I'm still trying to figure out how to handle that in this story. (Not sure if Katara would recognize Camels or Crocodiles)


	12. To Alburna

A/N: I replaced many chapters after fixing grammar mistakes. Sorry for anyone that got all those e-mail notices. I made sure to have this chapter ready before replacing all the other chapters. By the way, when I edited the chapters, the marks I would use to separate POV wouldn't show up after I edited a document already uploaded to . So I used the xs

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Toph sat with her legs crossed, riding along on the back of, what Chopper called, a crab. There were animals similar to crabs in her world, but never this huge. Toph and Chopper had found Eyelashes, which is what Sanji had instructed them to do after they had tricked Crocodile. Eyelashes led them into the desert to a friend who he, as Chopper translated, said could help them out. The last thing Toph had expected was a giant monster like thing to be the camel's friend.

"You know, this is even worse than the boat." Toph commented on their new ride. She thought of how she much preferred Appa.

"But now we can move much faster!" Chopper exclaimed, sounding very excited. He then sniffed loud enough for Toph to hear. "Nami's perfume is that way!" He pointed forward. "We're getting close to the others!"

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Katara continued to run. She was hoping that they would find Chopper and Toph soon, and more so, she hoped that they were both alright. They were reaching the edge of the city and Katara could see the desert up ahead.

"There they are!" Sanji pointed.

Katara looked as saw a giant crab coming towards them. If she squinted, she could barely see Chopper, Toph, and Eyelashes riding on top. She was amazed at the size of the animal but a little disappointed that it was just a crab. It wasn't a spider crab or an otter crab, it was just a crab. As she thought about it, Eyelashes was just a camel. The animals in this world sure were boring, save for the sea kings.

The crab stopped immediately in front of the group.

"Neat!" Luffy shouted, stretching his arms to reach the top of the crab's head and pulling himself up.

"That crab does look a bit devious." Nami commented and pointed to the crabs eyes. Katara had to agree, the crab had an almost drunk look in his eyes.

The animal did offer an easy way for everyone else to board. He lowered his claws and everyone who did not have Luffy's mobility climbed on to them. The crab lifted his claws and everyone stepped on to his back.

Katara immediately ran over to Toph. "Toph are you alright?"

"Except for the way this thing moves, yeah I'm fine." Toph replied sounding slightly annoyed.

"To Alburna!" Chopper commanded the large crab. The crab then began to run very fast sideways. Katara was surprised at how much speed the animal had. They would surly reach the capital by morning.

Vivi suddenly screamed. Katara turned and saw her being pulled violently away from everyone. She was flying backwards towards city of Rain Dinners.

"Vivi!" She yelled along with everyone else and reached for her. But she was now too far away. Katara then noticed a golden hook around her waist that looked exactly like the one Crocodile had. She also saw sand trailing behind the hook. Katara knew that Crocodile had her.

Luffy, stretching his arms, grabbed the hook and shot himself forward. He wrapped his arm around Vivi, switched places with her on the hook, and tossed her back to the crab. Both Katara and Nami jumped to her side to see if she was alright. Luffy did not follow.

"Luffy!" Nami yelled focusing her attention back on her captain.

"You guys go ahead, I'll kick Crocodiles ass!" He ordered, becoming further and further away.

Katara was worried. "Should one of us stay with him?"

"No Luffy will be fine." Zoro replied, though there was a hint of worry in his voice. "Getting Vivi to the capital is our first priority." Zoro almost instinctively seemed to take over as leader in Luffy's absence.

"But Luffy has never faced anyone like Crocodile." Vivi pointed out almost in tears. "He's one of the Seven Warlords, and the World Government doesn't choose just anyone for those positions."

Nami stepped up and put her hand on Vivi's shoulder. "Don't worry Vivi, when Luffy chooses his opponent, he always comes out as the winner."

Katara only hoped that Nami was right.

Vivi walked to the edge of the crab that would be nearest to Luffy. She put her hands by her mouth as a way to magnify her voice and yelled loudly, "Luffy! We'll meet you in Alburna!"

On their journey to Alburna, Katara noticed that everyone was mostly quiet, save for Usopp who was telling Chopper and Toph stories about his "adventures". Chopper believed every one of Usopp's stories while Toph did not believe a single one. However, despite not believing him, she was enjoying his stories. It was a source of entertainment for her because she was completely blind while on the crab. Toph would often question the parts of his stories that did not logically make sense. Usopp would always come back with outlandish reason for the holes in his tales. One story that Katara over heard, was Usopp explaining to the two that he was the one who taught crabs how to move sideways. He even had a pretty heroic story that went with it.

It was getting darker and colder. Zoro had Eyelashes balance on the dull side of his sword, and used him as a weight that he lifted repeatedly. Katara couldn't believe how much balance the camel had.

"Hey Zoro, shouldn't you be saving your strength?" Nami asked eyeing him.

"Shut up." Zoro replied coldly, and continued to work out.

"Leave him be Nami-san." Sanji advised. "If he doesn't exert his strength, he'll be beside himself with tension. He gets worked up easily. And besides," Sanji suddenly breathed out smoke from his cigarette. "He just got a full blown taste of the level of the Seven Warlords."

Zoro suddenly stopped mid lift. "Hey dumbass, what are you trying to say?"

"Ok fine, I'll come out and say it." Sanji was absurdly calm. "You are afraid that Luffy might lose."

"What!" Zoro set Eyelashes down. "You think I'm afraid! Curly eyebrows!"

Sanji seemed to take that as an insult. "Ok now I'm pissed!"

The two jumped up and both at the same time yelled "You wanna fight!"

_Boink! Boink!_ Nami hit them both on the top of the head, effectively knocking them down. Even after the amount of times she had seen it, Katara was still amazed that Nami could do such a thing.

"Knock it off!" Nami yelled sounding a bit tense. "We have more important things to worry about!"

Katara realized that this fight must have everyone on edge. She was glad to know that she wasn't the only one worried about Luffy.

"He's fine!" Vivi said cheerfully, though Katara could hear some nervousness in her voice. "We said we'd meet up again in Alburna."

"You're the one worrying the most!" Usopp exclaimed, also sensing the uneasiness in her voice.

Nami stepped up to Vivi and lighted swatted her in the head. "You just worry about the rebellion!"

Vivi seemed to only smile. Sanji and Zoro picked themselves back up but didn't say a word.

"Wait." Toph suddenly spoke. She was lying on her back, hands behind her head, knees bent and legs crossed. "When Usopp told me and Chopper about Crocodile, he said that attacks just passed right through his body and he wasn't hurt at all." She paused. "Luffy fights with his fists right? Well won't all his attacks just pass through Crocodile?"

Vivi's face went white. Katara felt herself go cold. Toph had a point, how was Luffy supposed to win if he couldn't hit Crocodile? She looked to see that everyone else seemed more worried.

"Um don't worry!" Nami spoke quickly, not sounding all that confident. "Luffy always finds a way to beat his enemies, he'll figure something out."

"I hope you're right." Toph replied not sounding completely convinced.

"Alright Scissors, full speed to Alburna!" Nami commanded the crab, effectively changing the subject.

"Scissors? What's that supposed to mean?" Asked Usopp.

"It's the crab's name." Nami said matter of factly.

"Scissors!" Usopp said in a tone that would suggest that the name was not very good.

''Got a problem with that?" Nami asked threateningly.

"Not at all." Usopp replied, obviously afraid of her.

The crab continued to travel though the desert. At one point, Katara fell asleep. She woke up hours later, feeling a little embarrassed. She noticed that Sanji, who was no longer wearing his desert robes, had thrown his black jacket over her as a blanket. This made her even more embarrassed. As she sat up, she heard Chopper speaking with the crab.

"What!" Chopper exclaimed. "You won't travel through water!"

Vivi's eyes perked up. "Yes that's right, he's a sand crab, they spend their lives burrowing through sand, and they never go into the water."

"This is bad." Usopp stated. "There is a river that crosses through Alabasta, and Alburna is on the opposite side that we are on. There is no way we can avoid it."

"And it looks like we'll be at the river soon." Katara pointed in the direction they were headed. She could see a strip of water starting to come into her view.

"Is there any way we can convince this crab to make an exception?" Sanji asked.

"Well, Eyelashes said that he and all his friends are perverts and love dancing girls…" Chopper began.

"You mean like this?" Nami suddenly threw off her robes, now only wearing the dancer outfit she had on the day before.

Sanji, Eyelashes, and Scissors all suddenly had hearts in their eyes, and Scissors suddenly began to move much faster. Katara felt herself fall down to her side from the sudden change in speed. When she picked herself up, she saw that they were getting closer to the river at a much faster rate.

Scissors approached the river and was moving fast enough that he was able to run on top of the water. Katara was quite amazed than an animal would be able to do such a thing.

"Alright it worked!" Usopp cheered.

"Keep going Scissors!" Chopper encouraged.

Their hopes were cut short. About halfway across the river, he started sinking, unable to keep up the speed. Once Katara had hit the water and managed to catch her footing on the bottom, she learned that the water came up to her chin. She quickly looked around for Toph, who was short enough that the water would be over her head. Katara was relieved when she saw that Usopp had her. Toph held on to his shoulders from behind, and Katara saw that her legs were resting in his arms that he had behind his back. She also noticed that Usopp had a newly acquired red mark on his face.

"Toph we have to teach you how to swim." Usopp said boosting her up.

"That would be useless, I can't feel any vibrations in the water, and I'm completely blind right now." Toph explained hanging her head.

"Well if you fall into the water, just fill yourself up with air and stay calm, you'll float." Usopp suggested. "When you thrash around like you were before, it makes you sink faster. And it's harder to get to you." Usopp pointed to the red mark on his face. Katara had figured out what happened.

"Really?" Toph replied sounding somewhat astonished.

Katara looked around to make sure everyone's head was above water. The only other person she was really concerned about was Chopper, but she saw that Zoro had him up on his shoulders. Everyone else was above water and they began walking across the rest of the river. Luckily, the river did not get deeper. The water itself was cold. Katara wondered if she should make an ice walk or split the water in the river to make a walking path, but she figured that it would be better to save her energy after everything that had happened earlier that day.

Once they had reached land and everyone was out of the river, Katara used her water bending to move the water off of everyone's clothing, drying them.

"Hey that was very nice!" Nami commented. "I thought I was going to freeze!"

"Yeah, I was worried about that too!" Vivi added smiling.

"Katara-chan is so wonderful!" Sanji said now in love cook mode.

Usopp dropped Toph back onto the ground. "Finally." She said once her feet had touched earth.

"How much further to Alburna?" Zoro asked looking into the direction they were supposed to travel.

Vivi sighed, "It still pretty far, and it will take a very long time on foot."

Just then, a running sound was heard up ahead. Katara and the others saw Carue, along with many other ducks like him running towards the group. There seemed to be the exact number of ducks needed. She also noticed that the ducks were all different sizes. Some were very large, and others were small, the rest fit somewhere in the middle.

"It's the Spot Billed Duck Squad!" Vivi exclaimed happily. "Carue thank you!"

Carue and the Spot Billed Duck Squad stopped in front of Vivi and saluted. Carue then pointed to a side pack that each duck carried. Vivi opened up the pack and found a white desert robe inside. "What's this?"

Nami looked into another Duck's pack. "There is one in here too."

"This one has it too." Chopper added standing at another duck.

Sanji smiled. "I get it, if we all are wearing the same thing, Baroque Works will not be able to tell which one of us is Vivi."

Katara walked over to a duck that she figured would be a good size for her. She pulled out the white robe and switched it with her other desert robes. She had almost forgotten about the dancer girl outfit she still wore underneath. She climbed on her duck like everyone else was doing and then watched Toph very awkwardly climb on top of hers.

When everyone was on their duck, they immediately started running towards Alburna, with Carue in the lead. Katara was surprised at how fast the ducks could run. She looked to see Toph holding hers by the neck for dear life, clearly not enjoying the ride.

"When we get to the city," Zoro began. "There will probably be assassins waiting for Vivi. That Mr. 2 bastard will probably be among them."

Katara eyed Zoro, wondering where this was leading.

"Vivi, you should stay behind and let us enter the city. We'll distract anyone that is waiting for you." Zoro advised.

Nami spoke next. "That's right, we should all make sure that any assassins think that one of us is Vivi." She thought for a moment. "Other high ranking Baroque Works agents may be waiting for us. We have yet to meet the Mr. 1 and Mr. 4 pair, nor have we met Mr. 2's partner."

"But I don't want anyone to get killed by an assassin because of me." Vivi stated.

"Vivi, you worry about stopping the rebellion, we'll handle any assassins." Nami said sharply.

"We're going to call assassins after us?" Usopp said sounding a little scared.

"I don't care what we do, as long as I can get off of this bird." Toph commented sounding like she was about to be sick.

"Toph do you have the other sea sick patches I gave you?" Chopper asked sounding concerned.

"Yeah I guess I could put them on." Toph replied digging into her robes.

Katara was a little uneasy about the plan. She did want to help Vivi, but being a distraction for an assassin was a little worrisome for her. She remembered when they faced, as Sokka and Aang called him, Combustion Man, and how they could barely handle him.

The ducks continued to run through the night. It was dawn by the time they could see the city of Alburna ahead. Katara began to feel nervous, wondering what was in store for them. Through the journey, they added more to their plan. When they were in eyesight of any Baroque Works agents, they would all split up into groups of two and enter at a different entrance. Katara and Toph were a group and they would enter at the southwest entrance.

"Vivi, you should wait here for the rebel army and let us go ahead." Sanji suggested. "We'll handle anyone waiting for you."

Vivi nodded uneasily.

The rest of the group charged ahead. Katara could see a small group of people waiting at one of the entrances. Vivi said that they were on the east side of the city, which is the direction that the rebel army would be coming from.

As they approached the entrance, Katara got a better look at her enemy. There seemed to be six people waiting for them, all were eyeing the Straw Hat pirates. Katara steered her bird to have it run south ward. She looked to see that Toph's bird was following, happy that it understood the directions it was given earlier. She could hear someone chasing after them.

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A/N: If that last part was a little confusing, basically the Spot Billed Ducks seem to have some human sentience. The one that Toph was riding was instructed to follow Katara so that the two would not get split up. Being blind and not being on the ground, Toph would not be able to steer herself.

Earlier when Usopp was helping Toph out in the river, he was basically giving her a piggy back ride. I tried to explain that above, but no matter how I wrote it, I felt that it sounded a little… wrong.


	13. Baroque Works

AN: Ok this will be interesting. I'm nowhere near as creative as Oda when it comes to battles.

Avatoa: You are correct, I did miss the kung fu dugongs. When I watched the episode, I realized that I forgot to introduce them in earlier chapters because I started the desert chapter kind of in the middle to cut down on that part. I realized that was a big mistake. So I just cut that part out of this story.

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Katara turned the corner quickly, still riding her spot billed duck, and rode through the entrance she and Toph were assigned. She looked to see that Toph's duck was still following. She knew someone was following the two of them and she yelled out loud enough for him or her to hear "I am Princess Vivi!" Hoping to fool the person.

Once they entered the city, they both jumped off their ducks. Katara saw that their follower hadn't caught up to them yet.

"Finally that ride is over!" Toph said happily.

"Well don't be too excited, one of those Baroque Works agents is coming." Katara laughed in an attempt to mask her anxiety.

Toph grinned. "Oh you have no idea how ready I am to fight whoever it is."

Katara continued to laugh. She was happy that Toph was at least optimistic. The two of them discarded their desert robes favoring to wear the clothing underneath. Katara was now wearing her dancer outfit and Toph was wearing her usually attire. Katara made sure that her canteen was secured tightly around her waist as it was the only water she had on her at the moment. "Come on, let's go a little further into the city, I'd like to be around more water when whoever comes."

Katara began to walk and after only taking a few steps, she felt her arm get caught on something. She tried to pull her arm away, but it seemed to only get caught more. It was like some strange sort of silk covered in honey.

"Hey why did you walk into that?" Toph questioned sounding very confused.

"Walk into what?" Katara asked feeling a little scared. "There is nothing here!"

"Yes there is," Toph replied. "It's all over those buildings. There is no way we could have gone further into the city." Toph suddenly looked alarmed. "Hurry and get out of that, someone is…" She was soon interrupted.

"Well, it looks like only one of you got caught in my trap." An unfamiliar voice behind them said. "Doesn't matter, you two won't be much of a challenge."

Katara turned to look. She saw what she thought was a very cute guy, but on closer inspection, Katara noticed obvious female features. The woman looked to be in her late 20s early 30s and had black hair pulled back into a pony tail. Her outfit looked similar to what some in her world wore, a men's black kimono with orange trim. She had pale skin and would be considered tall, at least in the world Katara and Toph were from. Katara also noticed that she had long black nails. By the way the woman stood, she reminded Katara of a warrior. The expression on her face was completely serious.

"Who are you?" Katara asked coldly.

The woman cleared her throat. "I am Mr. 2's partner, Miss Halloween." She then seemed to notice Katara struggling to free herself from the trap. "Don't even bother trying to free yourself, my trap is made out of the same stuff we used to tie up the king, and he hasn't moved all day." She paused. "When the rebel army arrives, I will surround the entire city with it and no one will escape." She gave a smug smile as she finished. Then she seemed to be eyeing both Katara and Toph. "Shame, looks like I followed a damsel and a little blind girl, this won't be much fun."

Katara was about to yell that she was not a damsel but Toph spoke first.

"Why are we even listening to what you have to say! It's a waste of time!" Toph yelled loudly and she stamped her foot into the ground causing a boulder to pop up. Using her earth bending, Toph kicked it hard and hurled it at Miss Halloween.

Miss Halloween dodged and giggled. "If you want a fight, I can certainly give you one. I'll even show you my devil fruit ability, although it will be completely unnecessary for this." Her body then started to transform. She grew larger, two appendages on each side sprouted between her arms and legs. She grew two front fangs from her mouth; eight eyes appeared on her face.

Katara gulped when the transformation was complete. In front of her stood a giant black spider that had an orange spot on its back, and orange leg tips. Katara then wondered why they waited for her to completely transform. She then looked at the Miss Halloween's trap and realized that it was a huge spider web.

"The kumo kumo fruit." Miss Halloween said coldly.

"If you're a bug then I'll just squash you!" Toph challenged. She used her earth bending once again, this time to split the earth under Miss Halloween. Miss Halloween did not waste any time, she jumped up into the air and pointed her body downwards and spit poison at Toph just as Toph hurled another boulder at her.

"Toph move! She just spit poison!" Katara yelled. She did not know what the heck was going on. Spiders couldn't spit poison! Ok not the ones in her world because they were usually combined with a different animal, but she still didn't think that Miss Halloween's spider form should be able to do that.

Toph ran from the spot she was standing. When the poison landed, it burned a small hole in the ground. Katara shuttered at how potent it was. Then she wondered how she was supposed to dodge if Miss Halloween had targeted her. She was still stuck in her stupid web.

Miss Halloween was hit by Toph's boulder, but she seemed to recover quickly and managed to land on the ground gracefully. "That is a nice attack you have, but you'll have to do better than that to hurt me."

"Don't worry, I can do much more." Toph responded coldly.

Katara sighed; she was so embarrassed to be stuck and unable to do much to help Toph. The more she struggled, the more tangled her arm got. Miss Halloween's words were starting to get to her; she was pretty much a damsel at the moment. Katara did have her water in her canteen, but she figured that she needed to save it for an opportunistic moment, or else it would be wasted. Katara really that wished Sokka was with them, he would have found a way to free her. Sokka would probably also know an easy way to defeat a giant spider. Aang and Zuko could probably use their fire bending to burn the web. She sighed, wishing the entire team was there.

Miss Halloween suddenly darted at Toph, and Toph yelped and dove out of the way. She rolled on the ground. Miss Halloween spat more poison at her and Toph quickly used her earth bending to block it by raising a rock wall between the two of them. A hissing sound was heard as the poison ate up some of the rock.

Miss Halloween launched herself into the air again.

"Katara what is she doing!" Toph asked frantically.

Katara looked up at the giant spider. "Nothing! But she is going to land on top of you!"

Toph dodged again, Miss Halloween barely missing her. Katara noticed that Toph was a little bruised. Miss Halloween spat more poison. Katara saw that Toph was not going to have time to block it. She quickly used her free arm to do simple water bending and redirected the poison, changing its course to a sharp right turn. If she had both arms free, she could have used the poison as a weapon.

Miss Halloween looked at where the poison had landed and was very confused. "Hmm, there wasn't any wind blowing."

Miss Halloween jumped into the air once again, instead of using poison she tossed a perfectly formed web at Toph.

"Toph move!" Katara yelled once again not wanting her friend to become trapped in a web like she was.

Toph barely dodged the web and was now breathing heavily. As soon as Miss Halloween landed, Toph used her earth bending to trap her legs into the earth, intending to immobilize her. "Now you can't move and do that annoying jumping!" There was a hint of frustration in Toph's voice. Katara noticed that Toph was starting to become exhausted.

Miss Halloween only laughed seeming unfazed at her situation. "I think I have figured out your power. If I'm not on the ground, you don't know where I am. Is that right? Well if that is how you "see", you will not survive long on this ocean."

Katara was now worried. Thos woman was not even slightly concerned that Toph had trapped her legs nor did her body seem at all tired. Just what was she planning?

Toph didn't answer Miss Halloween, instead she prepared for her next move. To her surprised, Miss Halloween effortlessly pulled her legs out of the earth, freeing herself.

"No way!" Toph exclaimed genuinely scared. "That was solid rock!"

Katara was also scared, a spider should not have that much strength. She doubted that spiders in this world were that strong.

"It seems that anyone you have ever faced has been extremely weak." Miss Halloween said mockingly, having no knowledge that where Toph and Katara were from, there were no people with super strength. "The Grand Line is not a children's play ground."

Miss Halloween jumped into the air once again intending to exploit Toph's weakness. Toph opened the earth she stood on and buried herself into the ground.

When Miss Halloween landed, Toph launched a boulder at her from underground. It hit Miss Halloween in the abdomen and knocked her on her side. She quickly flipped herself back over on to her legs. She used her front spider leg to punch a hole into the ground revealing Toph below. Toph used her earth bending to move more earth to get away from her. Katara was horrified when she saw Miss Halloween spit poison underground.

"STOP!" Katara roared. She opened her canteen and used what little water she had to make a water whip with her bending. Using one hand, she clumsily guided it over where Miss Halloween was digging into the ground. It was hot out and her water whip was already drying up. With the amount she had left, she whipped Miss Halloween hard and still managed to create a gash on her back.

Miss Halloween stood up suddenly and eyed Katara. She jumped into the air towards the web she had made, transforming to half human half spider. She landed perfectly onto her web. Katara thought she looked extremely creepy. She still had two spider legs between her arms and legs and she had eight eyes. The rest of her body was human. Miss Halloween glared at her.

"So you want to die first?" Miss Halloween whipped a web at her and it wrapped around her neck, the other end was in Miss Halloween's hand. Miss Halloween yanked on the web whip and it tightened around Katara's neck. Katara felt her air supply being cut off. "It seems that you can control water. Isn't a shame that we are in a desert where water is scarce, and whenever you do find it, it always seems to dry up quickly?" Miss Halloween then grinned. "Thankfully, my web has a special coating that keeps it moist so that even in the hottest of places, it won't dry up and crumble." She then laughed. "You know, I should have gotten rid of you earlier, that way the little girl never would have known my poison was coming."

"Katara!" Toph suddenly burst out of the ground. She launched another boulder at Miss Halloween.

Miss Halloween let go of the web that she was using to strangle Katara and jumped into the air again. "I think it is time to end this little fight." Katara coughed and watched for their enemy, wanting to let Toph know everything that she was doing. To her shock and horror, Miss Halloween completely disappeared.

"Toph! She's gone I can't see her!" Katara yelled. She wasn't sure if spiders in this world had the ability to become invisible. She doubted it.

"What do you mean!" Toph yelled frantically. "Hey something fell down the back of my shirt-OW!" Toph screamed loudly and grabbed her back.

Miss Halloween suddenly appeared behind her. She grabbed Toph by the back of the shirt and lifted her up. "The wonderful thing about zoan type fruits, is that you can become the animal's actual size."

Katara glared at her figuring out what had happened. She wondered why Miss Halloween had waited until now to do that. It would have made much more sense to have used that trick once she found out Toph's weakness. Katara then wondered if she was just having fun with the fight.

"The poison is particularly dangerous." Miss Halloween said almost dismissively. "With someone her size, it shouldn't be long before it starts to take effect." Miss Halloween then tossed Toph violently off to the side.

Katara began to panic. Were they going to die here? What would Sokka tell her to do? She then shook her head. Sokka wasn't there; it was up to only her and Toph alone to defeat this woman. She thought of blood bending. But it still wasn't a full moon, and besides, do spiders even have blood? If only the stupid web didn't limit her.

It suddenly hit her. Miss Halloween had bragged that her web has a special coating to keep it moist, which was like a liquid. Could she use her bending on the spider web? It wasn't like her usual water and she would need a distraction to completely pull it off. Toph was lying down and Katara did not want her to move too much, or else the poison would spread much faster. She thought of an idea, but it would only work under a certain circumstance.

Miss Halloween now eyed Katara and began to approach her. "That little girl put up a good fight, but her abilities were not enough to stop me." She stopped a few feet in front of Katara. "Now, how should I kill you? Shall I suffocate you in a spider web, or should I melt you with my poison?" She transformed back into a giant spider.

Katara figured that she was a particularly vicious person, and she only hoped that this would work. "Oh please don't use your poison! That sounds horrible!" She then pretended to start crying.

Miss Halloween laughed. "You are a particularly pathetic one; I really hate people like you." She paused. "I will give you the full experience of a painful death!" Miss Halloween spat her poison, more than she had ever spit at Toph.

Katara acted fast. She quickly moved her free arm, bending the poison back at Miss Halloween. It hit her hard in the face. Miss Halloween screamed as the poison burned her eyes. She used her two front legs to rub them.

"You know," Katara began and started bending the liquid in the web. It moved like honey and she was happy for the distraction because this would be slow. "Poison is very much like water."

"Stupid girl I am immune to my own poison! That will not work!" Miss Halloween was now angry, a big difference from her usual calm demeanor. Katara figured that the poison was at least burning her eyes.

"Oh trust me I'm not finished." Katara replied coldly, she now had both her arms freed and a huge amount of the web under her control. Miss Halloween opened her eyes only to see her own web surrounding her. Katara, using her bending, manipulated the web to completely encase Miss Halloween's body, her head being the only thing not covered by it. She no longer had use of her legs. "Thank you for the tip about your web having a nice wet coating, it really helped me out." Miss Halloween looked horrified and struggled to get free. Katara saw that the web was starting to tear.

"Toph squash her!" Katara ordered afraid that Miss Halloween would get free.

Toph rolled over, and with her hands on the ground, split the earth under Miss Halloween. Miss Halloween fell below ground level and Toph brought the earth back together very violently. Katara cringed at the very thought of what had most likely happened. Toph opened up the earth and Katara looked down, expecting to see a giant squashed spider. To her surprise, Miss Halloween was back in her human form, not squashed, but definitely knocked out.

Toph then fell to the ground moaning loudly. "Toph!" Katara cried knowing that she would have to do something about that poison. She figured that Miss Halloween would not be gaining consciousness any time soon and started to run to Toph side. She wondered if she could use her water bending to heal her. Then she realized that she did not have any more water and that there didn't look to be any around. Could she use her sweat? Her Spit? The moisture from the web?

"Well it looks like you two took care of her." A very familiar voice said amusingly. "You should be proud; she's quite a skilled assassin."

Katara turned around quickly, feeling very angry. She knew the voice belonged to Miss All Sunday. The Baroque Works vice president was approaching them slowly.

"Such a shame, I came here to collect some poison for the boss, but looks like I won't be able to now." Miss All Sunday laughed. "Since you won the fight I have-"

"We don't have time to deal with you!" Katara screamed loudly. She saw that a puddle of Miss Halloween's poison still remained. She quickly used her bending, intending to kill Miss All Sunday. She didn't have time for another fight, her friend was dying!

Miss All Sunday glared at Katara. "I am very sorry that I have to do this."

Before Katara could even process what Miss All Sunday had said, arms sprouted everywhere on her upper body. Four grabbed her own arms, restraining them, and prohibiting her from using her water bending. The poison fell to the ground. Two other arms covered her nose and mouth, making it impossible to breath. Finally, two more arms came out of the ground and grabbed her legs, not allowing her to walk or run.

Katara tried her best to break free of the arms, but it was no use.

"You will lose consciousness much faster if you struggle like that." Miss All Sunday informed almost sounding amused.

Katara did not care; she needed to help Toph. If Miss Halloween was being truthful about the toxicity of her poison, then did not have much time. She also did not want to be killed. They had just fought and overcame a very difficult opponent. It almost seemed unfair that another would show up soon after.

"Well I guess I'll make it painless for you." Miss All Sunday smiled.

Katara's eyes widened. She felt two more arms sprout from her back grab her around her neck. Miss All Sunday gripped her tightly with the two new arms and everything went black.

Toph lay on the ground. Her ears were ringing and she could feel her heart beating heavily. Sweat was pouring out of her and she felt her limbs stiffening. Her whole body was shaking and it felt as though the ground she was lying on was spinning in circles. It was becoming more and more difficult to breathe. She was also having trouble feeling the vibrations in the earth. To her, it felt as though there were three Kataras. Someone else was approaching, Katara sounded so far away but she thought that Katara was not happy to see this person.

A few moments later, she thought she felt the new person standing over her.

"Your prize for winning is the antidote to her poison. Though, I still can't promise that you will live."

Katara felt herself waking up. Her neck hurt.

"I'm alive?" she asked out loud to no one in particular.

"Yep, I thought you'd never wake up." Toph replied sounding both relieved and a little impatient.

Katara pulled herself up into a sitting position and saw Toph sitting next to her. "Toph are you alright… wait you've been poisoned!"

"It's alright." Toph spoke. "That lady helped me out. I think she gave me medicine but I'm not too sure." Toph extended her arm. Antidote had been injected into one of its veins.

"Lady?" Katara repeated sounding confused, and then she remembered Miss All Sunday. "Toph you took something from that woman! Why would you trust her! She's our enemy!"

"Yeah, well I didn't have much of a choice." Toph replied. "You were out cold and I would have died from the poison anyway. I didn't have any strength to fight her back." Toph paused. "She said it was my prize for winning."

Katara sighed not knowing what to think. Toph was right, she most likely would have been dead. Still, it seemed very strange. "Well you should still take it easy. I don't know much about that spider, but Miss Halloween made it sound like its poison was very dangerous."

For once Toph seemed to agree with her. Katara noticed that she looked a little sick and her skin was pale.

"Do you think you should do something about the rest of the web?" Toph pointed to the web that still covered part of the perimeter of the city.

"I guess so." Katara replied. She stood up, walked closer to the web, and used her bending to pull the coating off. It took a while to get all of the web, but soon, the web crumbled and no one would accidently get stuck in it. Ironically, she found a fountain just around the corner where they were fighting.

"If only we walked just a little further." Katara frowned. She gathered up some water to give to Toph. Toph was breathing heavily and Katara assumed that her mouth was dry. She also wondered if she would be able to help Toph recover faster from the poison. Katara also made sure to gather up water for herself too, which she placed in her canteen.

Toph gulped down the water Katara had given her very quickly. Katara almost wondered if she was going to ask for more.

She heard someone else approaching. "Katara! Toph! Thank God you two are alive!" It was Chopper's voice.

Katara turned to see Chopper in his reindeer form carrying a very heavily bandaged Usopp on his back.

"Chopper what happened to Usopp!" Katara shrieked.

"He was hit by a four ton bat, don't worry, he'll be fine." Chopper explained.

Toph stood up, and was very shaky.

"Toph are you alright?" Chopper asked.

"That lady we fought turned into a giant spider. Then she became small and bit me." Toph explained.

"What kind of spider was she?" Chopper asked.

"I don't know." Toph replied.

"She had orange on her back and on her feet." Katara replied trying to describe Miss Halloween's spider form. "The rest of her was black."

Chopper's eyes widened. "That spider is very poisonous! Don't move!" Chopper shrank and became his smaller size and ran to her, causing Usopp to fall to the ground.

"Hey Chopper what gives!" Usopp yelled. Katara ran to his side.

"Don't worry, someone else gave me medicine for it." Toph pointed to the spot in her arm where Miss All Sunday injected her. Chopper inspected the site of the injection.

"But you need more than one dose." Chopper replied sounding very worried. "And it takes time for it to fully work."

"Who gave her an antidote?" Usopp asked Katara sounding a little skeptical.

Katara frowned. "It was Miss All Sunday." She used the water she had gotten for herself at the fountain to start healing Usopp's wounds. She knew it would take a while before he was fully healed.

"Why would she help her out?" Usopp was now confused. "Isn't she our enemy?"

"Toph said that Miss All Sunday said it was her prize for winning." Katara rolled her eyes. She was slightly worried that the antidote might have had something dangerous in it.

"Maybe she thought she was insulting you guys by taking pity." Usopp suggested. Then he smiled. "Doesn't matter, she'll regret it later."

"Where did she bite you?" Chopper asked Toph.

Toph lifted the back of her shirt and pointed to the bite. She didn't have to; Chopper could clearly see where she had been bitten. Katara looked over to see the bite mark and she cringed. There were two large red marks on her back, much larger than the spider's teeth would have been. The area surrounding the bit was brownish.

"It looks like the skin around the bite is dying." He commented. Then he took out his medical equipment. He put some sort of lotion over the bite mark and then covered it with a bandage.

Someone else approached them. It was Sanji with Eyelashes following behind.

"Looks like you four made it out just fine." He said. He then went into love cook mode. "And Katara-chan! I was coming to help you! But you do look lovely in that outfit!"

Katara blushed, forgetting that she was once again wearing the dancer outfit. She did notice one thing, the dancer outfit did allow her to move her arms much more freely than her long sleeved clothes did.

Sanji then breathed smoke from his cigarette, becoming serious. "We should head to the palace. Vivi might be waiting for us there."

"What about Usopp? It will take a while to heal him." Katara pointed to their heavily bandaged comrade.

"He'll be fine, you can finish later." Sanji replied. "We'll throw him on the back of Eyelashes."

"Oi." Usopp responded sounding annoyed.

"However," Sanji paused and then went into love cook mode. "When I am badly injured, will you heal me Katara-chan!"

"Um yeah sure." Katara replied and wasn't completely sure if that was the right answer.

"Toph will need to ride on Eyelashes too." Chopper informed. "She shouldn't move that much."

"They should both be able to fit on Eyelashes." Sanji looked at the camel. He then picked up Usopp's injured body and tossed him onto the back of Eyelashes. Katara cringed wondering if that had hurt. Sanji then picked up Toph and gently set her at the front of Eyelashes. Chopper climbed up to ride on the camel's head.

The group then headed off to the palace, while simultaneously looking for Zoro and Nami.

XXXXXXXX

A/N: Alright, my first attempt at writing a fight. Sorry for throwing Katara off to the side for part of it. I was trying to find a way to write it without the entire thing being: Katara threw water, Toph tossed earth, Katara threw water, Toph tossed earth. Ok it wouldn't have exactly been written that way but you get the idea. It also gave Katara time to think up a way to defeat the enemy instead of her putting all her thought into water bending.

I had her be the spider fruit because spiders scare me. I am nowhere near as creative as Oda so this is probably a little cliché. I didn't specify any particular model and I'm not good at coming up with names. When I had it in mind, I thought of both the funnel web spider and the Brazilian wandering spider, both are two of the most poisonous in the world.

Katara and Toph fought this battle together just to get used to the One Piece world and get an idea of what they could be up against in the future. A lot of the fights in Avatar used team work. They will get individual battles. I was trying to figure out how to make this character a challenge for them but I also did not to draw the fight out too long. Let me know how I did. I could be editing this chapter in the future. If anyone thinks something didn't work well or if something needs to be changed, let me know.

Also for Katara's healing abilities, I don't want her to completely make Chopper's job as the doctor useless. Thankfully, in one episode, where Toph got her feet burned, Katara said it would take a while to heal them. So I figured Chopper would heal all fatal wounds that would take Katara's healing too long to take effect before the patient dies. Katara would then heal the wounds after the patient is stabilized. Chopper is also responsible for all sicknesses.

For Miss Halloween, I typically hate OCs unless they are absolutely necessary. I figured she'd be very serious and a bit sadistic, who also would like to brag. Ultimately, if she had taken out Katara first, she would have killed Toph. I was going to have more dialogue between her and the Avatar characters at the beginning, but then I realized that Toph wouldn't sit and listen to an enemies conversation, she'd jump right into fighting.


	14. Stop The Bomb

"I'm very worried about Luffy." Usopp said lying on Eyelashes back as the group headed towards the palace. "What if he couldn't defeat Crocodile!"

Sanji looked at him and frowned. "Do you really think Luffy would die?"

"I don't know! He's never faced one of the seven warlords!" Usopp exclaimed nearly in tears.

Sanji then grinned. "Don't worry, Luffy isn't dead, we'll see him again soon."

Usopp's concern had only made Katara worry more. She remembered back to what Miss All Sunday had told her. 'Such a shame, I came here to collect poison for the boss.' Katara suddenly feared the worst.

"Wait, after our fight, Miss All Sunday came and said that she was supposed to collect poison for Crocodile." Katara began. "Does that mean Crocodile is here?"

Everyone, except for Toph, looked at her.

"What! Luffy can't be dead!" Chopper shrieked, jumping back to the worst conclusion.

"Crocodile must definitely be here!" Usopp moaned in tears.

"Hey don't worry!" Sanji cut in quickly. "If Crocodile is here then Luffy must be here somewhere too!" He didn't sound completely sure of himself.

"I hope you're right." Toph replied sounding a little worried.

The group continued to run. Fighting had broken out in the city and Katara wondered if Vivi was alright. The rebellion had not been stopped and she felt bad for her friend. She also wondered where Nami and Zoro were and if they were alright.

Katara could see the palace up ahead. If she wasn't so worried about the others she would have admired how large and fancy it was. As they got closer to the palace, sand was floating around everywhere, making it impossible to see other people nearby. It was almost like there was a desert storm in the city, only without wind blowing.

When they approached the palace grounds, though the sand floating in the air was even more intense, they saw none other than Luffy and Vivi. There was also a man dressed in white, with markings on his face standing with them.

"Luffy you're alright!" Usopp exclaimed with tears in his eyes. He had jumped off of Eyelashes and stood next to Chopper.

"Vivi!" Katara along with Chopper called out to the princess.

"See I told you Luffy would be alright!" Usopp cried.

"That's not what you said earlier." Toph pointed out.

Katara noticed that Luffy had a barrel tied to his back. He was also spinning his arms in a way that looked like he was twisting them up. She wondered what he was planning.

Vivi turned to face the group. "You guys made it!" She said happily. She looked at the man dressed in white. "This is Pell; he is one of the guardians of Alabasta."

Sanji then went into love cook mode and began asking Vivi is she was alright.

Katara looked up at the palace to see that Crocodile stood there. She wondered what had happened during his and Luffy's fight back at Rain Base. She also figured that he was the one responsible for all the sand in the air.

"Usopp!" Nami's voice yelled angrily.

Katara turned just in time to see her hit him on the head with a blue staff she hadn't seen Nami carry before. She also saw that Zoro was with Nami. She was happy that they were both ok.

"Who asked you to make me a bunch of party tricks!" Nami yelled.

"Hey you can stand!" Zoro yelled angrily at her. Nami ignored him.

"Hey it has some moves too!" Usopp defended himself and rubbed his head.

"I'll deal with you later!" Nami yelled. "Vivi how are you!"

Katara hadn't known that Nami was a fighter. She looked closer at the weapon wondering what it could do.

"Everyone," Luffy said suddenly with his back to the crew. "I'm sorry, but I lost to Crocodile back at Rain Base." He then turned to face them. "However, this time, I will kick his ass." Luffy then extended his arms up to the palace walls, grabbed on, and then flung himself up. Katara watched him disappear over the edge.

"Oh no I almost forgot!" Vivi suddenly shrieked completely breaking everyone's attention off of Luffy. "There is a bomb set to go off in ten minutes that will destroy the entire city! Everyone in a five kilometer radius will be killed!"

"Why didn't you tell us that sooner!" Usopp cried.

Nami spoke next. "Five kilometer radius! That means that both the rebel and royal armies will be wiped out! As well as all of us!"

"Um what's a bomb!" Toph interrupted. Katara had the same question.

"What's a bomb!" Usopp repeated sounding as though he couldn't believe that they didn't know what one was. "Never mind, I'll explain later, but just know that if a bomb goes off the entire city will be incinerated!"

Katara gulped. "What does a bomb look like?"

"They will probably shoot it out of a cannon." Usopp replied. "You've seen them on the Merry, look for one of those."

Katara nodded, knowing what a cannon looked like.

"We need to search for the bombers." Zoro said sounding very serious. "And stop them from setting off the bomb."

"How are we supposed to find the bombers?" Usopp asked sounding very skeptical.

"And in only ten minutes!" Nami added frantically.

"We don't have time to think about this!" Zoro said quickly.

"Wait, if the blast is supposed to kill everyone in a five kilometer radius, then they must be shooting the bomb from at least 2.5 kilometers away." Usopp informed. Katara was not quite sure what he was talking about.

"No, I think the bombers will be closer to the square." Vivi disagreed.

"But why?" Usopp questioned. "If that were the case, then the bombers would be killed in the blast too."

"That is just the kind of man Crocodile is." Nami said coldly.

"What! He'd let his own men die!" Chopper exclaimed.

"Cunning bastard." Sanji said.

"Shouldn't we hurry then?" Toph pointed out. "It's not like we have a lot of time."

Toph did have a point. Katara wondered why they were standing around talking when they had very little time to stop the bomb. She then saw both Pell and Zoro grab their swords. Before she could even ask what they were doing, Zoro slashed a guy that approached Vivi from behind and Sanji simultaneously kicked the attacker. Katara didn't even notice Sanji prepare himself to attack.

More rebel soldiers gathered around. There was still so much sand floating around that Katara did not see them approach. "We found you now Princess Vivi!"

"Billions!" Vivi cried.

Zoro looked at Sanji. "Two seconds?"

"Yes all we need is two seconds." Sanji confirmed. "Everyone get going!"

Everyone nodded and began to run to look for the bomb. Usopp was running on his own despite his injuries, and Toph was still riding Eyelashes. Chopper had insisted that she not move too much.

"Everyone split up!" Usopp ordered. "We have to get out of this damn sand cloud!"

Everyone ran in separate directions. Pell surprised Katara by transforming into a large white bird and flying into the air. She assumed that he had a devil fruit.

Katara motioned for Eyelashes to follow her, not wanting to be separated from Toph. She led the camel in a direction she had not seen any of the others go. She looked around frantically for anything that resembled a cannon, but found nothing. Katara ran into many soldiers which she quickly fought off with her water bending. Luckily, the city had plenty of water fountains and water lines.

"Toph, where do you think they would hide a cannon?" Katara asked feeling discouraged. She looked up at the clock. Earlier, Nami had explained that when the larger hand hit the bottom number, that time would be up. It was now on the last number before the bottom.

Toph shrugged. "I don't know, the Going Merry doesn't have any earth on it, so I have no idea how big they are or what shape they are in."

"There you are!" Someone yelled behind Katara. She quickly turned and blocked a man's sword with the water she carried, causing it to fly out of his hand. She then whipped him with her remaining water, knocking him to the ground.

"That was close!" Katara shrieked. The man's sword must have been centimeters away from her face and she wasn't sure how he had completely missed.

"Katara," Toph began. "Just let me walk, I can help you fight off the soldiers."

"Toph you've been poisoned, you're not supposed to be walking!" Katara protested.

"Well, if we don't find the cannon then it won't matter at all if I was up moving around!" Toph pointed out feeling very impatient. "Besides, Chopper isn't with us, he'll never know."

Katara sighed realizing that they did not have much time to argue. "Alright." She helped Toph climb down from on top of Eyelashes.

"This is much better!" Toph said happily once her feet had hit the ground.

Having Toph to help her fight ended up being a huge help. Katara was able to look for a cannon, while Toph fought off any attacking soldiers. Many times, she had a soldier defeated before Katara even knew they were nearby. Usually, it only took one simple technique from Toph to have them immobilized. The biggest advantage of having Toph, was that the sand cloud did not impair her ability to "see" any attacking soldiers.

Katara wondered if it would have been better to have had one of the other Straw Hat pirates with them. She still wasn't familiar with many things in this world and she was a little worried that she might accidently miss the cannon.

She also thought that it was odd that no sooner had she joined up with the Straw Hats, had she managed to get herself caught up in a war of a nation that she knew nothing about. She did like Vivi, and did not regret her decision, but she was very afraid for her life at that moment.

Katara looked back at the clock. The larger hand was now between the two numbers. She had little time left. Then she realized something, could the cannon possibly be inside of the clock tower? The more she thought, the more she realized that it would make sense to have the cannon up high.

"Toph! I think I know where it is! Follow me!" Katara said quickly and ran towards her destination.

Toph followed. "Where do you think it is?"

"I think it might be in the clock!" Katara replied. "The clock looks like it's on a tall building."

"I hope you're right!" Toph replied. Her breathing was becoming heavy.

As Katara approached the clock, she saw that the other Straw Hats were already there. Zoro and Sanji were in the clock tower, but not at the top. They were also on separate floors, Zoro being on a floor much higher than Sanji. Usopp had Chopper in his reindeer form on his shoulders, and Chopper had Vivi up on his. Nami stood in front of them with her weapon. They seemed too have already figured out where the bomb was. Katara looked and saw that it was very near time for the explosion.

A rebel soldier ran towards Nami with his sword drawn. Toph reacted first and hurled a large boulder at him, sending him flying.

Nami seemed to react and saw Katara and Toph approach.

"Thank you!" She said happily.

Katara looked up at the clock tower to see that the face was now open. She could see the cannon and two people, a man and a woman, looking out from inside of it. They were both dressed very oddly, even for this world, especially the woman. She then looked back at the set up wondering exactly what they were planning.

"What's going on here… Oh never mind just do whatever it is you're about to do!" Katara realized that there was absolutely no time for explanations.

"Can you keep all the soldiers off of me for the next few seconds?" Nami asked urgently. "I need to concentrate on this!"

"Leave it to us!" Katara replied. Luckily she found a fountain near the clock tower.

"Toph! What are you doing walking around!" Chopper yelled.

"Not the time to worry about that!" Toph cried and earth bended another boulder at another soldier approaching Nami.

Katara ran to the fountain and gathered up water. More soldiers were approaching Nami and she quickly used her water bending to knock them all out of the way. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Usopp, Chopper, and Vivi flying upwards. She took down another soldier and ran to Nami's side, watching everything else take place. Chopper had jumped from Usopp's shoulders up to Sanji.

"Who are those two people in the clock tower?" Katara asked figuring that they were the bombers. Usopp had landed on the ground right as she finished asking that question.

"Vivi said that they were the 7 pair and that they are snipers." Nami said nervously. "I don't think they've noticed us yet."

She watched as Sanji kicked the group up even higher. She saw Zoro jump out and place Chopper's feet on the blades of his swords. The seven pair then looked down in their direction.

"Gero Gero Gero, what do we have here?" The woman asked sounding very amused. They both pointed their guns at Zoro, Chopper, and Vivi and fired.

Zoro quickly launched Chopper up higher, however, the bullets had still hit him in the chest.

Chopper became his larger form and threw Vivi up the rest of the way. It looked like the plan was going to work. She watched Vivi land at the opening of the clock tower, swinging her chain weapon. Katara hoped that she was able to take out the seven pair and handle the cannon.

Katara noticed that it was nearly time for the bomb. She braced herself preparing for an explosion. Sanji landed on the ground in front of the clock tower not too far away from Katara and Nami. Zoro landed next to Sanji on his back. Chopper fell on top of a marine a bit of a distance away from the group. Katara looked back up at the clock and watched the clock hand move to the time when the bomb was set to go off and snapped her eyes shut. She swore she saw her life pass before her.

Nothing happened. Vivi must have stopped the bomb. She breathed heavily and opened her eyes. Nami's expression was the same as hers.

"Did she do it?" Katara asked. Toph had stopped fighting off soldiers and walked up next to her.

"I think so." Nami said quietly.

They waited for Vivi to poke her head out of the clock tower and tell them that everything was all right. It seemed like it was taking way too long for her to do so.

Chopper ran up to join the group. "Is everything all right."

Zoro frowned, still looking up at the clock. "Something funny is going on up there."

"Vivi hasn't come out yet." Nami added.

Vivi's head popped out of the clock tower and she screamed loudly. "Everyone! The bomb wasn't stopped! There is a timer on it!"

"What!" Katara screeched.

"Damn it!" Nami cursed. "Crocodile must have prepared for this!"

"Can we still stop it?" Toph asked sounding scared.

"I don't know." Nami replied sounding defeated.

Katara then saw Pell fly to the tower and watched him disappear inside. A few seconds later, she saw him flying up to the sky carrying a huge round shaped thing.

"Is that the bomb?" Katara asked Nami.

"It must be." Nami said quietly.

"What is happening?" Toph asked sounding both confused and scared.

"We think Pell is flying away with the bomb." Katara explained. "What's he going to do with it?"

She saw that Nami had a horrified expression on her face.

Pell flew higher and higher until Katara could no longer see him. There was suddenly a very loud explosion and the sky became completely engulfed in a bright white light. She even felt a heavy wind from the explosion, but it wasn't strong enough to knock her down.

"That was a bomb…" She said quietly once everything had calmed down. She also realized that there was no way that Pell could have survived that explosion.

She noticed that the noise from all the fighting had somewhat stopped. Katara looked and saw that the soldiers from both armies were looking up at the sky, wondering what had happened.

The moment of peace did not last long. The battle soon picked back up.

"Everyone stop fighting!" Vivi's voice was heard up in the clock tower. Katara turned to see Vivi shouting out to the crowd.

"You idiot." Nami said quietly, a hint of sadness was in her voice. She then pointed to everyone. "Everyone! Punch them! Kick them! Knock them over! Save as many lives as you can!"

Katara knew what Nami had meant. She ran to the fountain once again, gathered up water, and used it to knock over several soldiers from each army. She continued to repeat the process.

She heard Chopper yelling at Toph not to move and Toph explaining that she didn't have to move to earth bend. Toph mostly sat and used her earth bending to knock out many soldiers. For some, she sank their feet into the ground to hold them in place, but few were strong enough to pull their feet out.

Katara froze a few people against the walls of buildings. She wasn't sure how long the ice would hold, being in a desert and all. If it would slow them down, that might be enough to save them. She debated healing some of the injured soldiers, but she wasn't sure if that would help or hurt the problem.

She wondered if Luffy had defeated Crocodile. Even if he had, that still wouldn't stop this war. Most of the soldiers had no idea that Crocodile was behind all of the country's problems. Vivi had explained a few days prior that the rebellion had started up after the king was accused of hoarding dance powder, which caused a huge drought all over the country. With all the chaos, there was no way to convince the people that the king was framed and that the country's hero Crocodile was responsible for the drought.

While Katara was fighting off the soldiers, she would catch glimpses of Sanji and Zoro fighting. She was very impressed to see each of them single handedly take out several soldiers at once. In a way it was scary how much strength they had. She also thought that having them on their team during the war with the fire nation would have been very helpful.

At one point, Katara noticed that Toph was bent forward with both hands on the ground, and was breathing heavily. Katara ran over to her.

"Toph! Are you alright!" Katara asked, worried that the poison was starting to take effect again.

"I'm fine, don't worry." She replied, and then quickly earth bended at another soldier.

"Take it easy if you have to." Katara advised, hitting another soldier with a water whip. She knew that Toph wasn't telling the truth.

Toph suddenly jerked. "Um Katara, you're going to think this is crazy, but I think the ground is about to explode."

"What?" Katara asked wondering if she really was being affected by the poison. But then she felt the ground shaking heavily. And it only got worse. Katara looked into the distance and saw several buildings falling over. The ground below the falling buildings was rising up and it looked as though it was about to burst.

"Um Toph, I think you are right about the ground exploding." Katara said sounding a little nervous. Just what was going on?

The ground did burst open and a figure flew upwards.

"Hey look!" Sanji pointed towards the figure, drawing the other Straw Hat pirates' attention to it.

Katara looked closer at the figure.

"What is it?" Toph asked waving her hand in front of her face reminding Katara that she couldn't see.

"It's Crocodile!" Katara exclaimed sounding relieved, happy, and a little confused. He was nowhere near the palace where he and Luffy were supposed to be fighting.

"I'm not sure how he got blasted all the way over there." Sanji spoke thinking the same thing as Katara.

"Luffy! I never doubted you once!" Usopp said happily with tears in his eyes. "But he won!"

Nami, Usopp, Chopper, and Sanji all cheered. Toph cheered along with them, but she was too weakened by the poison to cheer loudly. Zoro stood smiling. Katara smiled too, almost feeling guilty for worrying so much about Luffy's abilities. She was also quite impressed that he managed to send Crocodile flying through the earth.

Many members of both armies seemed to stop and look at both Crocodile and the very fact that there was now a huge hole in the ground right in the middle of the city. Some however, continued to fight.

"Everyone stop fighting!" Vivi yelled once again.

Almost as if on cue, Katara felt a drop of water hit her in the forehead. She looked up to see rain falling.

The rain seemed to be enough to stop both armies. Many soldiers looked up at the sky, almost confused at what was happening.

Very loudly, Vivi yelled one last time. "Everyone stop fighting!" Now that the streets were quiet, save for the falling rain, the soldiers of both armies were able to hear Vivi's voice.

A crash was heard that slightly startled Katara. Crocodile's body had landed not too far away from them. He was unconscious and bleeding badly.

"I'll show that Crocodile…" Usopp began stomping towards him. Sanji stopped him by grapping on to the top of his head.

"Hey now." He warned.

"Everyone!" Vivi yelled as loudly as she could. "You don't have to fight anymore! The rain has finally fallen!"

There was a pause, but then one of the rebel soldiers spoke.

"We don't have to fight anymore?" A rebel soldier said angrily. "What are you talking about? The royal army has been fighting dirty this whole time!"

"Yeah! They shot Kohza when he said that we weren't going to war!" Another rebel pointed out. "And we can't forget all the things that the king has done!"

Katara wasn't sure who Kohza was or what had happened to him. But she realized that it might have been a little too idealistic to think that the rain would end the fighting. Both the rebel and royal armies looked as though they were about to resume the battle.

"Royal army! Throw down your weapons!" A voice cried from the palace. "Do not resume fighting!"

Katara saw a man with short black hair looking very worn down. She figured he must be very important because the royal army was following his orders. She also thought she heard people calling him Chaka.

"Mah! Mah! Mah!" Another voice said from behind Katara. "Rebel army you do the same!"

Katara turned and saw a man, with large blond curls in his hair, carrying a young boy. If it had been days ago, Katara would have found his appearance to be very strange. But she was now becoming accustomed to the clothing and hair styles of this world.

"That's the cross dressing guy from Whiskey Peak!" Zoro shouted sounding shocked. Katara did not even question that line. She just figured that cross dressing men were common in this world.

"Igaram? He's alive?" Nami questioned also sounding very surprised.

"Who is he?" Chopper asked. Katara was happy that she and Toph weren't the only ones left in the dark about some things.

Igaram was surrounded by many rebel army soldiers. He looked down at the child. "Hey can you speak?"

"That's the kid from Nanohana that the royal army attacked!" One of rebel soldiers commented.

"No," The kid said. "Someone else did this to me. It was a weird guy that disguised himself as the king! And he had a lot of make up on!"

Katara figured that the man was Mr. 2 impersonating the king.

"Yes this war was set up." Another voice said.

Everyone looked to see an injured man breathing heavily.

"Kohza!" One of rebel soldiers said loudly.

"Yes it was set up." Igaram said. "I shall inform everyone of what happened in great detail."

Zoro looked at the group. "Come on everyone, we shouldn't stick around here. This doesn't concern us anymore."

"Sorry, but I don't think I can walk any further." Toph apologized sounding very weak. She was hunched over and breathing even heavier than before.

Chopper became his reindeer form and walked over to her. "This is why I told you to not move so much! The antidote doesn't cure the poison that fast!" He lowered his body to the ground and Katara helped Toph climb onto his back.

The group began to walk away from the armies as Igaram explained about Crocodile, dance powder, and Baroque Works. The headed towards an empty street. Usopp complained of pain, which Katara did not blame him for at all. Zoro ended up dragging him along by the foot, much to Usopp's dismay.

They were suddenly met by someone that looked very familiar carrying Luffy on his back. Katara thought that Mr. 2 might have had the guy's face. Luffy was unconscious and looked badly injured.

The man's eyes widened. "Who are you?"

Sanji smiled. "That guy that you are carrying, he's with us, we'll take him from here. Thank you for getting him out of there."

"Oh so you're the pirates who brought Vivi back to this country?" the man said.

"Um who are you?" Sanji asked.

"Father!" Vivi's voice was heard from behind them. She was running through the streets.

"Father?" Sanji repeated. His expression then changed dramatically. "What you're Vivi's father!"

"Oh so he's the king." Zoro said matter of factly.

"This man saved my life." The king said pointing to Luffy. "After he defeated Crocodile, he carried both of us to the surface."

Both? Katara wondered why there would be another person down there with them.

"Hey don't we have to worry about that poison?" Usopp noticed that Luffy had somehow been poisoned. Katara figured that Crocodile still had some of Miss Halloween's on hand.

"Don't worry, he's already taken the antidote, he'll be fine for a while." The king explained. "But he needs to be treated for his wounds, as well as all of you."

"Do you have any more of the antidote!" Katara asked the king. "My friend was poisoned too, and I think it was the exact same type of poison."

"There is not much left," The king pulled a bottle out of one of his pockets that had a green liquid inside of it.

"No that's plenty!" Chopper said happily. "Katara give Toph the rest of it."

Katara took the bottle from the king and carried it over to Toph. She pulled Toph off of Chopper's back and set her against the wall of a building. "Toph drink the rest of it."

Toph drank down the rest of the antidote. "It tasted horrible." She groaned.

"Well would you rather die from the poison?" Katara laughed.

"Vivi, you should get back to the square." Zoro said. "The people will be waiting for you and the king."

"Wait we should all go." Vivi said smiling.

"Vivi, we're pirates, we can't go with you." Sanji replied lighting a cigarette. "We're marked men and we can't concern ourselves with countries."

"We'll get to the palace when we are ready." Nami grinned. "We're exhausted right now."

Vivi and her father smiled and walked towards the square.

When they were out of sight, Sanji, Nami, Zoro, Usopp, and Toph all collapsed and fell asleep.

"Should she be sleeping?" Katara eyed Chopper and pointed to Toph.

"As long as she's had more antidote, she'll be fine." Chopper replied. He followed suit and fell asleep with the rest of the crew.

Katara did feel extremely tired. She had been up all night and only had a short nap. She had also taken out a Baroque Works agent, ran around a huge city looking for a bomb, and fought many soldiers with the intent of stopping them from fighting each other. She was exhausted. She sat herself down, laid on her side, and fell asleep.

XXXXXXXX

A/N: This was the hardest chapter to write. I don't know why because I like this part in the show. I kept getting writers block. It was also weird bringing in characters that Katara haven't met at this point in the story. Like Kohza, Igaram, Chaka, and Pell. Lot's of rewriting and editing went with this chapter. Criticism welcome!

Also I don't remember too well, but are there bombs and clocks in the Avatar world? I know that the numbering system would be different because I think the clock in Alabasta had roman numerals.

The whole Usopp noticing that Luffy was poisoned, I'm not exactly sure either, but that was how it happened in the anime. Not sure if he saw purple fumes or what.

The line where Zoro accuses Nami of being able to walk, after her battle with Miss Doublefinger, she complained of being injured and demanded that Zoro carry her, which he did.

But next chapter will be the last Alabasta chapter.


	15. Setting Sail

Three days had passed since Crocodile had been defeated. Katara spent most of her time helping Chopper tend to Luffy's wounds. Katara had never seen injuries like the ones he had. Chopper had done a quick operation on him and they both saw that some of Luffy's organs looked as though they had been dried up. Chopper of course, took advantage of Katara's water bending to have her redirect liquids into any dried up areas. She was also able to speed up the healing process after surgery was complete. Luffy had lost a lot of blood and required a transfusion. He remained unconscious with a fever those three days.

When she wasn't tending to Luffy, she spent her time with Vivi and Nami. Vivi had lent Katara and Nami each an outfit to wear. Katara now wore what learned was called a tee shirt. It was light blue with an image of seal on the front of it. She also wore a pair of jean shorts. It was odd wearing the clothing of this world.

Vivi also had clothes for Toph. They were clothes that she wore years ago and had out grown. Toph wore a green tee shirt and black capris. She had insisted on not wearing anything that felt tight.

Currently, Katara was sitting in Vivi's room with Vivi, Toph and Nami. Vivi had taken Toph's hair out of its usual style and was brushing it.

"Ow! You're pulling!" Toph complained.

Vivi giggled. "Toph, you have long beautiful hair, you should take better care of it. It's so full of knots."

"No I don't really care that much about it." Toph replied. "I've never been into that kind of stuff."

"Maybe you should cut it short." Nami suggested.

"Well," Toph paused. "My mom always liked it long. I'd rather keep it that way."

Katara was surprised at Toph's response. She knew that there had been tension between Toph and her parents, mainly due to them being very over protective. She noticed that Toph did look a little sad. Katara wondered if Toph had kept her hair long to feel close to her mother.

Her thoughts were interrupted when a palace attendant knocked on Vivi's door and informed them that Luffy had woken up.

XXXXXXXXXX

When they arrived in the palace infirmary, Luffy was already sitting up in bed asking for food. Sanji, and Usopp were there too. Zoro arrived shortly after. Luffy, after being informed that he had been asleep for three days with a fever, commented that he had missed fifteen meals.

"You counted five meals per day." Usopp pointed out.

Katara was happy to see that Luffy was back to his old self. She knew that most people, three days after surgery, would have nowhere near the energy he had.

A woman that looked a lot like Igaram arrived rolling a cart of food. "Hello everyone." She greeted.

"I didn't know you were actually into that kind of thing!" Zoro exclaimed, thinking that this woman and Igaram were the same person.

"No, this is Terracotta, Igaram's wife." Vivi introduced the new woman.

Zoro looked at her with an uncomfortable expression on his face.

The woman rolled the cart of fruit next to Luffy. "I heard you are a big eater, do you think you could snack on some fruit until dinner time?"

"Okay." Luffy responded. Katara would not have believed it if she hadn't seen it, but with in the blink of an eye, Luffy turned his head opened his mouth, and devoured all the fruit on the cart in one bite.

"Luffy!" Katara scolded instinctively, finding the action to be very rude.

"Was that some kind of a trick!" Zoro and Sanji both yelled at the same time.

Nami looked embarrassed and Toph and Vivi both laughed.

"Hey old lady, I'm going to eat three days worth of meals." Luffy stated.

Katara groaned, feeling embarrassed by her captain's behavior and hoped that Terracotta wasn't offended by how blunt he was.

"Oh I was hoping you would say that!" The lady sounded as though she were accepting some kind of challenge. "I have been a chef for thirty years and I will not lose to a youngster's stomach! So eat all you can."

XXXXXXX

Katara could not believe the manners at the table. Luffy, Zoro, Usopp, Chopper, Sanji, and Toph were stuffing their faces with food as though their lives depended on it. Only Nami was eating her food politely. She expected this from Luffy, but not from the others. Luffy was also stealing food off of everyone's plate.

"Stop stretching!" Nami scolded him.

Usopp put Tabasco sauce on a rice ball hoping that Luffy would steal and eat it. When he did, Luffy turned his head up and spit fire causing Usopp to laugh hysterically.

The meal was very delicious, but Katara found it hard to enjoy with the way her crew mates were acting. She swatted away Luffy's hand when he tried to steal some vegetables off of her plate.

Katara was a little disappointed with Toph. She had figured that, because Toph had come from a very wealthy family, she would know how to act in front of royalty. One time, Toph stabbed Luffy's hand with her fork as he tried to steal food from her. Katara wondered how Toph had even known his hand was there because her feet were not on the ground and nothing in the room was made out of earth or stone.

She looked over at Vivi, hoping that she wasn't upset with them. But Vivi was laughing as she watched everyone eat, which made Katara feel a little better.

XXXXXXXX

After dinner, Vivi's father had suggested that everyone use the palace bath house.

Initially, Toph had said that she did not want to take a bath. But Nami told Toph that she would take one because, out of all the girls, she needed a bath the most. Nami ended up dragging her to the bath house. Katara couldn't help but giggle. Toph did not exactly have the best hygiene.

Because the floors of the palace were not made out of earth or stone, Toph had to be led everywhere. She wasn't too happy about not being able to "see". Luckily for her, the bath house floor was made out of some kind of stone, so she did like being in there.

The bath house was beautiful. The stone it was constructed with was white and had various fancy carvings. There were golden lion fountains everywhere. It was also one of the biggest baths Katara had ever seen, even with the divide between the men and women's side.

After washing off her body, Katara wrapped a towel around her and stepped in. The water was so warm and felt very good. When she sat, the water came up to her shoulders. It was very relaxing.

Nami was washing Toph's back. "Seriously, don't you ever bathe!" Nami asked her.

"Well I really don't like being in water that much." Toph replied. She then smiled. "Besides, I'd rather have a healthy coating of earth on my body."

"That's disgusting." Nami made a face. "And here I was happy that we added more girls to the crew."

"Well, you'll like Katara then. She's very girly." Toph said.

Vivi giggled.

When Nami was finished washing Toph's back, Toph walked over to join Katara in the bath but she only sat on the edge and soaked her feet.

"Toph come in, it's very warm." Katara said. "And there is a step right here where you can sit so it won't be too deep."

Toph looked as though she were about to protest, but decided to try it out. She sat next to Katara.

"You know, this isn't so bad." Toph commented. "I like how it is made out of stone."

Katara heard commotion over on the men's side. She didn't think much of it until she saw that several of the guys were looking into to the women's bath. She blushed, but was at least happy that she had a towel around her body. However, she noticed that Nami, who was now having Vivi wash her back, did not. Nami's back was turned towards the guys so they couldn't see anything.

Katara stood up and got into a stance that she used for water bending. One large water whip would be enough to knock them back on their side.

"Alright 100,000 berry each." Nami's voice interrupted Katara's concentration. Nami wrapped her towel around her body and turned to face the guys. "Happiness Punch!" She flashed them. All of the guys fell back on to their side of the bath.

"Nami!" Katara shouted, not being able to believe what her friend had just done. Vivi had the same reaction.

After that ordeal, Nami and Vivi joined Katara and Toph in the bath.

"You know." Nami began speaking to Vivi. "We are thinking about leaving tonight."

Vivi looked at her almost startled. "Really?"

Katara was also a little startled. She hadn't heard about any plans to leave Alabasta that night and she was hoping to stay till morning. It was already very dark outside.

"Yeah we have no reason to be here anymore." Nami continued. "Our captain is awake, marines will be in the harbor, and our ship will be in danger."

"Oh I see." Vivi said sadly.

"Will you be going with us Vivi?" Toph asked.

XXXXXXXX

After the bath, Katara sat with the rest of the Straw Hat pirates as well as Vivi in a guest room that they had been using for the past three days.

"We should probably leave tonight." Nami began. "Our ship is in danger and we have no reason to remain here."

"We're leaving already?" Chopper said sadly.

"I agree that we should leave tonight." Zoro spoke.

One of the Alabasta servants entered the room with a snail phone.

"Straw Hat, someone named Bon Clay would like to speak to you." He said.

"Bon Clay? I don't know anyone named that." Luffy said.

"He says he's one of your friends." The servant said.

Sanji answered the snail phone. "Hello who is this?"

"Hello friends!" A voice Katara recognized as Mr. 2 yelled loudly.

"Why are you calling us!" Sanji yelled into the snail phone and hung up.

The snail phone rang again and Luffy stretched his arm to answer it. "What do you want?" He asked.

"Straw Hat!" Mr. 2 began. "First of all don't call me Mr. 2 anymore, call me Bon Clay. If the marines are listening into this conversation, I'll be in huge trouble."

"You would have just told them who you were!" Chopper shouted frantically.

"Anyway." Mr. 2 continued. "I have your ship."

"You took our ship!" Sanji yelled.

"No you have it all wrong! We're friends right?" Mr. 2 continued. "Meet me up stream on the Sandora River and I will return it to you!" He then hung up.

Katara wouldn't exactly call Mr. 2 a friend with him being a part of Baroque Works and all. She wondered why he would take their ship and what he was planning to do with it.

"Alright, we have to leave tonight." Zoro spoke. "We have to get our ship back from that bastard if we want to keep sailing."

"Yes I agree." Luffy said seriously giving the plan his approval.

"Everyone…" Vivi began. "What should I do?"

Everyone looked at Vivi.

Nami spoke first. "We'll give you 12 hours to think. Tomorrow at noon, we will swing by the eastern harbor, I doubt we will be able to drop anchor. If you want to keep sailing with us, that will be your last chance to jump on board."

Vivi nodded. "I will let you guys use the spot billed duck squad to get to your ship."

XXXXXXX

Before they left, Vivi had given them many bags filled with supplies, which included food, fresh water, and extra clothing. They left the palace by climbing out of Vivi's window and climbing down a rope. Zoro and Nami figured that they should not make too much commotion walking out of the front of the palace. Vivi waved to them as they made their way to the Spot Billed Duck bunker. Katara found the duck that she had rode to Alburna.

Soon they were off on their way to reclaim the Merry. It had gotten very dark and Katara had noticed that there was a full moon.

"Now we get a full moon." Katara groaned at the irony. It would have been a great night for her to practice water bending.

They continued to travel. At one point Sanji noticed that Nami looked a little down.

"Nami, are you alright?" He asked. "Oh you must miss Vivi?"

"I did a kind thing for her, I didn't ask for the 1,000,000,000 berry reward." Nami said sadly.

Katara nearly fell off her spot billed duck at her response. She couldn't believe that Nami was only thinking about money.

"Money!" Usopp exclaimed, "That was what it was all about!"

Everyone else looked shocked at her response too and most of the crew berated her for only thinking about her reward.

It was nearly dawn by the time they reached the location where they were supposed to meet Mr. 2, or as they were supposed to now call him, Bon Clay. Light was barely visible over the horizon. Bon Clay was waiting where he said he would be.

"Long time no see friends!" Bon Clay said cheerfully. He was standing on the ledge of the ship with his arms folded.

"Hey you were working for Crocodile." Luffy pointed out. "I wouldn't consider you a friend."

"Yes but we met and became friends before we knew that we were enemies!" Bon Clay defended himself. "I didn't know that you were escorting Princess Vivi! Besides, Baroque Works has crumbled; there is no longer a reason for us to be enemies!"

"What were you doing with our ship?" Nami questioned eyeing him.

"If I didn't take your ship do you have any idea what would have happened to it?" Bon Clay began. "This island has been blocked off by the marines!"

"Oh it might have been captured!" Luffy shouted at the realization.

"Might!" Bon Clay eyed him. "It WOULD have been captured! It's going to be very difficult to escape from Alabasta, so we will need our combined strength!"

"So you helped us out!" Chopper exclaimed in shock.

"Yes I did." Bon Clay grinned widely.

That was enough to win over Luffy, Usopp and Chopper. They all jumped on the ship and did a dance with Bon Clay while chanting the word friendship.

Katara still wasn't ready to trust him. He was their enemy and had helped ruin Vivi's country. Why were they suddenly working with this strange guy?

"Alright, let's get this stuff on board." Zoro pointed to the bags of supplies that Vivi had given them, completely ignoring the antics of Luffy, Usopp, Chopper and Bon Clay.

Katara grabbed two bags and boarded the Merry. She saw Toph carrying three.

"You know, you three could help us with all this stuff!" Toph yelled to Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper.

"Give me all the bags with food and I'll bring them to the kitchen." Sanji said.

One of Katara's bags did contain fruit, which is why it was probably so heavy. She handed it to Sanji, who had hearts in his eyes.

It wasn't long before they were setting sail. Bon Clay's ship followed. He remained on the Going Merry. Many of his crew mates waved to the Straw Hats, and a few asked if they remembered them.

As they neared Alburna, Katara heard several loud noises that sounded like explosions. Water splashed up on to the Merry and the ship rocked on the waves.

"The marines are shooting cannons at us!" Usopp cried. "We could sink!"

Katara looked at the cannons that the marines were shooting. They looked so familiar…

Several iron spears were also shot at the Going Merry and they stuck into side of the ship. Chopper ran around with lumber below deck, attempting to patch up the holes. Usopp stood next to one of the cannons. Nami was giving orders and Sanji, Luffy, Zoro, and Bon Clay were doing what they could to protect the Merry. Toph looked around confused.

"What should we do Katara?" She asked, sounding very sick. Toph could barely stay standing on the rocking boat and she hadn't gotten any sea sick patches from Chopper.

"Why don't you go below deck, you'll be safe there." Katara suggested knowing that Toph could not do much to help with the battle. "Maybe you can somehow help Chopper.

Toph groaned sounding a little frustrated but did go down below deck.

Katara saw an iron spear nearing the Merry. She jumped up and gathered up a ton of water from the ocean and hurled it at the spear knocking it far away from the ship. She did the same to another.

There were eight marine ships attacking them. They were grouped in pairs surrounding the Going Merry and Bon Clay's ship. It was going to be very difficult to escape without either ship taking major damage.

"It doesn't matter how much stronger we are than them on land." Zoro began. "It is going to be hard to defend against eight battle ships."

She heard Luffy shouting to one of the marines and it sounded as if he had met that marine before. She heard Luffy refer to him having a hypnotism power. Sanji also appeared to know another marine that was with the one Luffy was talking to. Katara looked towards that marine ship, but as soon as he did, she saw a cannon hit the ship. The ship fell apart and crushed the ship next to it. Katara looked over to see that Usopp had shot the cannon that had sunk it. He had an expression of total disbelief on his face.

"Wow Usopp that was you!" Luffy said sounding very impressed.

"Yes!" Usopp bragged. "That's what you get when you mess with the great captain Usopp!"

"Nose-chan! That was amazing!" Mr. Two complemented. "Now that the two ships to the south are gone, we should head in that direction!"

"Bon Clay it's no good!" said a man on Bon Clay's ship. "The black cage is coming!"

"What! No it can't be!" Bon Clay panicked.

"Black cage?" Luffy asked.

"Black Cage Hina!" Bon Clay shouted. "She is a marine captain who patrols this part of the sea! Now we have to head south quickly! It's the only way we can escape!"

Katara blocked another iron spear with water. She realized that if they did escape to the south, that they would never get to the location where they were supposed to meet Vivi. They would have to leave without knowing whether or not she had chosen to join the Straw Hats permanently.

"You can escape if you want. But we can't go." Luffy replied to Bon Clay.

"Yes we have to be at the harbor at noon." Nami added.

"What do you think you are doing! What will be waiting for you at the harbor?" Bon Clay asked frantically.

"A nakama." Luffy said smiling. "We promised we'd be there."

"A nakama!" Bon Clay repeated. He then broke down into tears of happiness. "Friendship is the most beautiful thing in the world!"

Katara blocked another iron spear and nearly missed another. She would have thought that Bon Clay's tearful break down was a little over the top, but she didn't have the time to put any thought towards it with the marines attacking.

"We will help you meet your friend!" Bon Clay shouted. He then ran to talk to his crew mates.

Katara was beginning to become fatigued. She blocked another spear and wondered how many the navy had. She knew it was wishful thinking, but she was hoping that they would run out soon. Katara then looked over at Bon Clay's ship and nearly jumped. She saw several of their members dressed up like the Straw Hat pirates. The one dressed like her was a very tall muscular dark skinned man who wore something that looked very similar to her water tribe clothes .The one that looked like Toph was a tall skinny man with short hair wearing all green. She wasn't sure how they were going to fool the marines. Bon Clay was disguised as Luffy.

Bon Clay's ship sailed away. To Katara's surprise, Hina followed his ship, being completely fooled by their disguises. Katara watched the marines catch up to them. When Hina had figured out that the Straw Hats weren't really on the ship, all of Bon Clay's crew members jump from their ship to the marine's and engaged them in battle. The marines attacked Bon Clay's ship and it was burned and broken apart. Everyone on Bon Clay's crew was captured by Hina very quickly. It all seemed to happen so fast that it took Katara a moment to process everything.

"Hey wait, why did we let him do that!" Katara demanded horrified. Bon Clay and his crew had basically sacrificed themselves for the Straw Hats. She felt bad for initially doubting him.

"Bon-chan!" Luffy yelled with tears in his eyes. "Bon-chan we will never forget this!"

Katara wasn't able to think about what had happened for very long. Usopp alerted everyone that more marine ships were closing in. She jumped back into action to defend the Going Merry, with Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji.

She heard Vivi's voice over a loud intercom. Unsure of how that worked, she quickly dismissed it as more technology of this world and went back to concentrating on the newly arrived marines.

Katara tried her hardest to listen to Vivi's speech. Many of the marine ships were very close to the Going Merry and she had to fight several soldiers that had jumped on board. They were very easy to take out because she was on the ocean and had plenty of water to use.

During her speech, Vivi talked about her adventures, she talked about islands she saw as well as the plants and animals that inhabited them.

Katara and the other Straw Hats finally defeated the attacking marines and they were able to sail forward.

Vivi continued to talk about a little boat, which she was obviously referring to the Merry and it soon sounded like she was talking about friendship.

"So that's it, she's not coming." Sanji concluded.

"This is obviously a broad cast from Alburna." Zoro followed.

Chopper and Toph came above deck to hear the rest of Vivi's speech.

"It might not be Vivi." Luffy suggested, "Maybe it's just someone who sounds like her."

"No Luffy I pretty sure that it is her." Katara said sadly.

"Will she still be at the coast?" Luffy asked sounding very worried.

"Maybe." Zoro replied.

"We have to hurry! There are more marine ships coming!" Usopp yelled.

Katara turned to see marine ships coming from around a large piece of land that had previously blocked them from view.

The Merry sailed forward to the place where they said that they would meet Vivi. As they neared the location, Katara saw two small figures waving. She smiled realizing it was Vivi and Carue. Vivi was wearing a very fancy dress, something that would be fit for a princess. Her hair also looked very professionally done.

"Is she there?" Toph asked.

"Yes she is!" Nami said happily.

"Quick! Turn the ship around!" Usopp shouted sounding excited. The Merry was facing away from the harbor in case they needed to make a quick escape. "We have to get her!"

"Hurry the marines are coming!" Chopper said urgently.

Vivi smiled. "I came to say goodbye!"

Katara's eyes widened as well as everyone else's.

"I cannot go with you." Vivi continued. "And thank you for everything! I want to have more adventures but I can't because…" She paused. "I love my country! That's why I can't come!"

"I see." Luffy smiled.

"But if we ever meet again." Vivi's sounded very choked up. "Can you still call me your nakama!"

Luffy looked like he was about to yell back to her but Nami stopped him by putting her hand over his mouth.

"If you tell her that she will still be your nakama and the marines over hear, that could cause trouble for her country. And she'll be a criminal! Let's just make this a silent farewell" Nami pointed to her left hand where her X was.

Katara knew what Nami wanted them to do. She quickly explained it to Toph who couldn't see where Nami was pointing. She was sad that Vivi would no longer be sailing on adventures with them, but she completely understood that she was needed in her country.

Everyone turned their back to Vivi and held up the arm that had an X on it. The marines began to fire more cannons on to them and Katara felt water raining down from their impact on the ocean. She looked over her shoulder to see Vivi and Carue holding their left arms up.

"Set sail!" Luffy suddenly yelled.

XXXXXXXXXXX

A/N: Alright the Alabasta arc is now over. I will be skipping all filler arcs. Those include each of the Straw Hat's individual fillers, Zenny, and Rainbow Mist. (God do I hate the Rainbow Mist filler!)

And another huge issue. There is a dispute over how names are spelled, mainly Enel and Eneru. Funimation calls him Eneru, other sources insist it is Enel. I was first exposed to it being Enel and I think that is the spelling most people are familiar with. So I will use that in the next arc. That is what One Piece wiki calls him and they have an interesting explanation for using that spelling.

New nakama in the next chapter.


	16. Nico Robin

Katara sat and sulked with the rest of the Straw Hats, minus Zoro. Even though she hadn't known her for very long, she was sad that Vivi had chosen not to travel further with the Straw Hats. Katara did realize that she was a princess and would need to tend to her countries needs, but she still missed her.

"Why is everyone so depressed?" Zoro asked sounding a little annoyed.

"We miss Vivi." Everyone responded at once.

"If you wanted her to come with us so badly, you should have kidnapped her." Zoro responded.

Everyone glared at him.

"Stupid marimo." Sanji began with the insults.

"Ass hole."

"Bastard."

"Jerk."

"Moron."

"Three sword style swordsman." Luffy finished.

"Um Luffy, that's not an insult." Usopp commented.

"Four sword style swordsman." Luffy attempted to insult again.

"No that's not an insult either, you just added one sword." Usopp responded and then explained to Luffy what a proper insult would be.

The door to the cabin opened and a voice that made Katara's insides go cold spoke. "Good to see we all got out of Alabasta."

Katara turned quickly to see Miss All Sunday standing in the door way, as though she belonged on the ship. Katara jumped quickly into a fighting stance.

"What are you doing here!" Katara demanded and prepared herself to water bend. She remembered back in Alabasta when Miss All Sunday had choked her.

"Who is that?" Chopper asked confused.

"It doesn't matter, she's an enemy!" Usopp responded to him.

Nami, Zoro, and Usopp also prepared to attack the woman. Luffy and Toph stood calmly and Sanji looked at her with hearts in his eyes.

Miss All Sunday knocked Zoro and Nami's weapons out of their hands. "Please don't point your weapons at me. I'm only here because of what your captain did to me back in Alabasta."

"Luffy what did you do to this beautiful woman!" Sanji yelled his face glowing red.

"I didn't do anything to her." Luffy replied sounding confused.

"Oh really? I was all ready to die back in that temple, but then you saved my life." Miss All Sunday explained. "So since I have nowhere else to go, can I be your nakama?"

"Ok I see." Luffy laughed. "Yes you can be our nakama."

"What!" Everyone minus Luffy, Toph, and Sanji exclaimed.

Sanji danced around cheering that another lady had joined the crew.

"Luffy don't you remember who she is!" Nami shouted in anger.

"Why do you always have to do stupid things Luffy!" Usopp yelled.

"Luffy she can't join!" Zoro yelled.

"She tried to kill me in Alabasta! Why would you want her on the crew?" Katara added to the protests.

"Actually Katara." Toph began. "You did attack her first, with poison even. So technically she did have a right to defend herself."

The others continued to argue with Luffy, while Katara and Toph broke out into their own fight.

"Toph why are you on her side!" Katara shouted, not appreciating Toph's stance on the issue. "It doesn't matter if I attacked first, she was our enemy! Why would I wait to let her attack me!"

"If she could have killed you she would have, but she didn't." Toph pointed out. "And if she hadn't shown up, I would have died from that poison!"

"She only gave it to you because we won the fight. She was probably undermining Miss Halloween for losing!" Katara was a little frustrated that Toph was somewhat right, but she did not want to admit it. "I really doubt she came all that way to save your life!"

"Well when she said "I really do not want to do this" and then knocked you out, she wasn't lying." Toph added.

"Toph you were poisoned! Your little truth sensors might not have been working right!" Katara pointed out.

"Katara! You're always like this. Back when Zuko joined us, you were the last one to trust him. And he ended up being a huge help." Toph argued now becoming frustrated with her friend. "If it wasn't for him, we probably couldn't have defeated the fire nation! Now the one person in Baroque Works, who helped us out during the war in Alabasta, shows up asking to join, you are immediately against her just because you lost a fight with her!"

Katara was fuming with anger at Toph. "Toph! You're just incredibly naïve! One day, someone is going to hurt you very badly just because you trusted them! The point is, Miss All Sunday was part of Baroque Works and is dangerous!"

"You know Mr. 2 was also… Oh never mind! You know what? I'm done; it's pointless to argue with you!" Toph started to stomp off. She turned to look at Miss All Sunday. "Hey, new member, what's your real name again?"

Miss All Sunday looked at her and smiled. "You can just call me Robin."

"Ok Robin, welcome to the crew." Toph then walked to another part of the ship away from Katara.

Robin was easily able to win over Nami, Usopp and Chopper. She handed Nami a small bag of jewels, and she used her devil fruit ability to make it look like Luffy had deer antlers to win over Chopper and Usopp. Katara sighed, hoping that at least Nami and Usopp would have brains about this. At least Zoro was still skeptical about Robin joining the crew.

After everything had settled down, and everyone had gone off to do their own thing, Katara spotted Robin standing at the edge of the Merry looking off into the distance. She walked over to Robin when she saw that no one would be able to over hear what she was about to say.

She stood next to Robin and put her hands on the rail.

"I just wanted you to know," Katara glared at Robin feeling déjà vu. "You may have won the others over with your little tricks but I'm not convinced that you are a good person. And if you hurt any of my friends in any way, I will toss you right over into the ocean."

Robin looked at her and to Katara's surprise, smiled. "Ok it's a deal."

Katara became angry. She was hoping that Robin would at least look a little frightened at her threat, but she almost seemed to accept it. Katara walked away, not wanting Robin to know that she had gotten that reaction out of her.

XXXXXXXX

In the days following, Katara had not slept much. She tried her hardest to remain awake all night, worried that Robin would attack while they were asleep. Robin now slept in Vivi's old bed, and Katara was not at all comfortable sharing a room with her. Some nights, Robin would be awake very late, which only made Katara more nervous. Those nights, she would pretend to be asleep, while keeping one eye barely open and on Robin at all times.

She and Toph had made up. It wasn't your typical emotional make up complete with each telling the other that they were sorry. It was more of a 'we're speaking again and we will ignore what happened that made us fight'.

One day, the Going Merry docked at a small island. It looked to be uninhabited and there was a large beach. Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper immediately ran into the ocean to play. Of course, because Luffy and Chopper had eaten devil fruits, they only went knee deep. Nami was walking around the island, preparing to start on a new map. Zoro was off lifting weights to train and Sanji remained on the boat to cook dinner. Toph was practicing her earth bending and Robin sat on the beach in a beach chair reading a book. Katara joined Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper in the ocean, but only because she was a little nervous about Luffy and Chopper playing in the water. She also wanted to practice her water bending.

"Hey guys watch this." Katara said to the boys, figuring that they would enjoy the water bending technique she was about to do. Katara created a huge water octopus with its legs moving around.

"So cool!" Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper all said at once with stars in their eyes.

"Throw something at me!" Katara challenged.

Usopp picked up a conch shell and hurled it at Katara. With her water bending, Katara used one of the octopus's legs to bat away the shell.

The three boys were even more amazed.

"So that's a defensive move?" Chopper asked.

"Yep." Katara said proudly. It had been awhile since she had used that technique and she was happy that she could still do it well.

"Katara try this one!" Luffy challenged picking up a very large rock twice the size of him. He threw it in Katara's direction.

Katara's face went white. That rock would surly crush her and the water octopus. She gathered up a ton of water and rushed it at the giant rock, knocking it to the side. It created a large splash in the ocean, completely soaking Katara.

"Luffy!" Katara yelled. "That rock could have crushed me."

"Huh? I thought Mr. Octopus could block it." Luffy innocently replied. "Besides, you were able to take care of it."

"No that was way too big!" Katara yelled back, she then ran after Luffy.

Luffy began laughing. "Hey Katara wants to play tag with us!" He began to run.

"No Luffy I think you made her mad!" Usopp warned.

"Oh don't think you're getting away that easy!" Katara yelled. "You may be strong, but water is your weakness and I can have full control over it!" Katara gathered up more water and hit Luffy with it knocking him down. He was in shallow enough water that he wouldn't risk drowning.

"Well I guess he deserved that." Chopper said.

XXXXXXXX

Toph decided to take a break from earth bending. She heard Katara, Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp in the ocean and, because she did not like to be in the water, she chose not to join them. She did hear Katara knock Luffy over, and then after she thought she heard her showing them her water bending techniques. She wasn't interested in even listening to them, as entertaining as they sounded. Instead, Toph chose to find Robin.

Toph could barely feel the chair on the beach that she knew Robin was sitting in.

"Hey Robin, are you still reading?" She asked. She had heard Robin open a book earlier.

"I can take a break." Robin replied and Toph heard her immediately close the book.

Toph sat down next to the beach chair. "How do you like sailing with us?" Toph was curious at how a former serious enemy would feel about this crazy crew.

"I do like it a lot, you're all very fun." Robin said happily. "But I don't think your friend likes me very much."

"Oh Katara," Toph knew exactly who she talking about. "Don't worry about her, it takes her a while to warm to people that were once her enemy, but she'll come around." Toph paused. "She was the same back in our world."

"I guess there is nothing wrong with being a little cautious." Robin laughed.

Toph was a little caught off guard with Robin's more optimistic response. "Well you're nicer to her than I would have been."

"So, you're from a different world?" Robin changed the subject. "Why don't you tell me about it?"

"Ok." Toph agreed. "In our world, there are four nations, Earth, Fire, Air, and Water. Well the Air Nomads are actually gone now. But… from each nation, there are people that can control an element. I am and earth bender, and Katara is a water bender."

"You have elemental benders in your world!" Robin interrupted in an uncharacteristic surprised tone.

"Yeah we do, but I think you guys have stories about them?" Toph questioned.

"Yeah they're in children's stories, and some believe that they were ancient warriors." Robin informed reverting back to her calm demeanor. "But most people you meet will say that they never existed." She paused. "Why don't you tell me more about your world."

Toph explained more about the four nations. She talked about the avatar, the war with the fire nation, Sokka, Zuko, Suki, Azula, and the attack on Ba Sin Sei. She even explained how she sees with her feet by using her earth bending. Robin remained interested all the way through.

"So you have no idea who attacked your home land?" Robin asked.

"No, one minute we were partying, and the next minute we were attacked." Toph responded. "I really thought we were all going to die, but then Aang sent us here." She then frowned. "Unfortunately, twinkle toes didn't keep us all together and now we have no idea where any of our other friends are."

Toph was about to say more, but Katara approached and interrupted her.

"Hey Toph, Sanji had dinner ready." Katara informed. "I guess it's for you too Miss All Sunday."

Katara then walked towards the ship.

"Ugh! Why does she have to be that way!" Toph groaned. "You know, calling her by her Baroque Works name isn't going to change anything!" She yelled after Katara.

Robin just simply laughed.

XXXXXXX

Days later Katara approached Luffy. She had been thinking about many things when she didn't have her eye on Robin. When they found their friends, they would most likely be returning to their world, which also meant that they would be leaving the Straw Hat crew. Katara wanted to bring this up with Luffy.

"Luffy, can I talk to you?" Katara asked. Luffy was sitting on Merry's head at the front of the boat looking forward.

Luffy turned around to look at Katara. "Sure." He jumped off of Merry's head and stood next to her.

"Um you know," Katara began. "When Toph and I find all of our friends, we will probably be going home. And I mean, back to our world."

"Yeah I know." Luffy smiled.

"And will you be alright with that?" Katara asked.

"Yes it's fine." Luffy replied. "And when you return to your world, we're all going with you."

Katara's eyes widened wondering if he misunderstood. "Um what do you mean?"

"I want to find the person that attacked your home and kick his ass." Luffy laughed.

Katara felt touched. She knew that if Aang could send everyone to this world, and could bring everyone back home, that he could send the Straw Hats back to this world. But could she really let that distract him from achieving his dream?

"Luffy, why do you want to travel all the way to a different world? What if, when you are sent back home, Aang sends you far away from the Grand Line and you have to start your journey all over again?" Katara asked. Aang had sent her and her friends all over this world; the same could happen to the Straw Hats.

"Katara, you and Toph are my nakama, it would be worth it for you two." Luffy responded.

Katara smiled. How unselfish he was. She knew that she and her friends would need Luffy's and the other Straw Hats to help to defeat whoever it was that attacked their home. They had all been defeated easily and it would probably be no different the next time they faced that enemy.

Katara was about to say something else to Luffy, but was interrupted when she saw black ash falling before her eyes.

"What's this?" She asked sticking out her hand.

"Look!" Luffy pointed up.

Katara looked and saw several planks of wood falling. Up even higher was a very large ship!

"What's going on!" Usopp yelled in fear. "There is a ship falling on us!"

"Where!" Toph covered her head, unable to see what was happening above.

Katara ran to the left side of the Going Merry, and used her water bending to create a large wave to push the Merry out from underneath the falling ship. The Going Merry tilted far to the side and Katara was afraid that she capsized it. Luckily it turned right side up. The falling ship crashed into the water next to them and water rained down on everyone.

"Very nice Ms. water bender." Robin complemented Katara. Katara just frowned and turned her back to Robin.

"Why would a ship fall from the sky?" Chopper asked looking up.

"That's by far one of the strangest things we've seen." Sanji added also looking up at the sky.

"Hey I think the log pose is broke." Nami stated looking at her wrist. It's pointing straight up.

Robin looked at the log pose. "No it's not broken; it's pointing to an island in the sky."

"An island in the sky?" Luffy repeated and then smiled. "Cool let's go!"

"That's impossible." Nami replied. "Just look up, you don't see an island up there."

"Hey I see an island!" Toph had her head tilted up and pointed.

Nami looked in the direction that Toph was pointing. "Where I don't see…" Nami began, then she blushed and frowned and looked at Toph. "You know that's not very funny!"

Toph, Usopp, Chopper, and Luffy laughed. Robin smiled enjoying the little joke.

"But back to what I was saying," Nami continued now annoyed. "There are no islands up there. We would be able to see them if there were."

"No it's not just an island up there, it's an entire sea." Robin explained.

"An entire sea?" Zoro looked up at the sky.

Katara looked up too, not completely believing that there was an ocean up there.

"Alright set the helm to the sky!" Luffy ordered.

"To the sky!" Usopp followed Luffy's lead.

"You morons," Sanji insulted. "Did you forget that the Going Merry can't fly?"

Luffy and Usopp both looked very depressed.

"I wonder if that ship came from a sky island." Zoro looked over at the ship that had fallen from the sky.

Luffy and Usopp both ran over and jumped inside of the remains of the ship.

Katara looked over at them. "Luffy, Usopp! Be careful in there, the ship is slowly sinking!" Katara warned. She jumped over into the ship with them, worried about their safety. She followed them in to the ship. The water level was slowly rising.

"Luffy! Usopp!" She called after them.

Luffy and Usopp both came running in Katara's direction.

"Katara! Look what I found!" Luffy shouted sounding very excited. He held out in front of him, a map o f an island called Skypea.

"You found a map of a sky island!" Katara exclaimed now believing that it was possible for it to exist.

"See we weren't gone to long Katara, you had nothing to worry about." Usopp said confidently.

Just then, the rest of the section of the boat that they were in had broken apart right where they were standing. Katara jumped and grabbed Luffy by the arm. She wrapped his arm around her shoulder, and used simple water bending to keep water away from the map as she and Luffy nearly fell below the water surface. They could now see the sky over head.

"Nothing to worry about?" Katara eyed Usopp.

"Hey come on, no one could predict that the ship would break apart like that." Usopp spoke quickly.

"Are you guys alright!" Chopper yelled frantically from the Going Merry. Katara saw the rest of the crew looking down at them very concerned.

"Hey Usopp grab a hold of Katara." Luffy ordered. Once Usopp had grabbed Katara, Luffy stretched him arm and grabbed onto the rail of the Going Merry and pulled the three of them up onto deck. Katara was afraid that she was going to smack into the side of the ship, but Luffy managed to pull her and Usopp up over the side.

"Luffy you moron! Katara-chan almost got hurt because of you!" Sanji scolded kicking Luffy in the head.

"Sanji it's ok, I'm fine." Katara tried to calm him down. She then used her water bending to dry off her, Usopp, and Luffy's clothes as well as any water that had gotten on the map.

Luffy presented the map of Skypea to Nami, who was shocked to say the least. Now they just had to find a way to get to the sky.

XXXXXXXX

A/N: Ok I really hope that Katara did not come off as too much of a bitch in this chapter. She isn't one to just accept a former enemy as a friend. I also figured that Katara would be a little scared of her because Robin's ability is an I win button against people of normal strength. (And most definitely against fodder marines)


	17. Familur Face

A/N: Quick announcement. Funimation has announced season four of One Piece! Which is awesome because Water 7 and Enies Lobby are two of my favorite arcs! They should be available in summer of 2012.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Katara sat on the Going Merry as they headed for an island called Jaya. So many strange things had happened in the last few hours. After finding the map of Skypea, Nami wanted to see if the sunken ship had any clues that would help them get into the sky. Usopp had used several barrels to create three underwater suits for Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji. He also created a system for them to breathe and to communicate with everyone while underwater.

Shortly after the three descended into the water, another ship came by; this one had a monkey for a captain. The crew of that ship all chanted "salvage" over and over. If the captain being a monkey wasn't strange enough, any time you told this guy that he looked like a monkey, he took it as a complement. The monkey's name was Masira and he claimed to be the salvaging king. He was going to use his own method of salvaging to bring the sunken ship above water. After sending many of his own men down into the rising ship and finding out that they were beat up, he became concerned that someone was trying to salvage the ship before him. None of the Straw Hats told him that they knew the people on the ship. Masira jumped into the water to figure out what was going on. Not long after Masira had dived down into the water had a giant turtle emerged with the wrecked ship in his mouth. It was the largest turtle, and possibly animal, that Katara had ever seen. Everyone assumed that Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji had been eaten with the ship. Because the tubes were still connected to the Merry, when the turtle began to move, it began to pull the ship with it. As if things couldn't get worse, darkness came over everything, and it was still hours away from nightfall. Not long after, Luffy's body was thrown from the water onto the Merry and Zoro and Sanji jumped on almost immediately after, each holding bags of items that they had found on the ship. Katara assumed that they had left the ship before the turtle had eaten it. Zoro and Sanji did not even notice the turtle. Masira jumped onto the ship next demanding that the Straw Hats give back the treasures Zoro, Sanji, and Luffy had found. He didn't have long to argue.

Something much more frightening was behind them. Katara saw three very large figures, so large that the giant turtle was completely dwarfed by them. The figures were in the shape of men with wings on their backs and they each held a giant spear. One looked to be raising his spear, as if to attack everyone on the sea. Chopper, Sanji, Zoro, Luffy, and Usopp ran to grab the oars to quickly row away and Katara ran to the back of the ship to use her water bending to move the Going Merry forward. Robin helped by creating dozens of arms to help with the rowing. Nami gave orders and Toph couldn't do much, her blindness limiting her. She sat against the mast of the Merry and could only enjoy the ride. They kept up a steady pace until they were no longer in the darkness.

Once they were out of the darkness, and had kicked Masira off of the ship, they had to decide what to do next. Robin had an eternal pose, which she claimed that she had stolen from Masira's ship, that would lead them to an island called Jaya. It was decided that they would go to Jaya to see if anyone knew anything about Sky Island.

Once they had reached the island, Katara had talked to Nami about shopping for her and Toph. The two of them only had one outfit each; save for the few items of clothing that Vivi had given them. Nami agreed that they would need more clothes and loaned them some money. She also said that they would have to pay her back with interest. Nami took Luffy and Zoro to seek out information about Skypea while Katara walked through the streets of Jaya with Toph. Robin also left the Going Merry to do her own thing.

"So where should we go first?" Katara asked. Jaya was a very lively island and seemed to be full of drunks. Katara had hoped that they would be able to find one good clothing shop that wasn't too expensive.

Toph smirked. "I don't care too much, I can't see any of the clothes that you'll pick out for me, so it doesn't really matter what they look like."

Katara knew Toph was right, but she still wanted her input. She figured that Toph probably would not like wearing any skirts or dresses. Katara also figured that she wouldn't be lady like enough for them either and would end up unintentionally flashing the other crew members. Katara also thought that she would want loose fitting clothes.

Katara herself, wanted clothes similar to what Nami and Vivi wore. She almost wished that Nami had gone shopping with her and Toph; it definitely would have been much more fun. Toph would not be able to give any opinions on the aesthetics of the outfits she picked out.

They soon entered a store that had discounted clothing. If they were going to be in this world long term, they would need many different outfits to wear day to day, especially if they were going to be traveling on a boat and would not know how often they would be on land.

Katara was right about Toph not being a fun shopping buddy. She figured that this is how it would be if she were shopping with a son. All Katara could do was pick out clothing for Toph to try on in the fitting rooms. Toph only gave her opinion on how comfortable they were. Katara guessed right about her not liking tight clothing.

Katara picked out her own outfits next. Toph spent most of that time asking her if she was almost finished, all while lying down on her back in a pile of discarded clothes in another fitting room.

When they were finished, they headed out back to the ship.

"Well I guess that wasn't so bad." Toph commented. "Shopping has never really been my thing."

Katara laughed. "You don't have to tell me that."

"Well I…" Toph began but she didn't get a chance to finish. Her attention was on something else. "I think I feel…" Toph then began to run in a different direction.

"Toph! Wait!" Katara ran after her. She nearly dropped one of her shopping bags. She sighed wondering what had prompted Toph to run off like that.

Toph ran around a building, she was still ahead of Katara. "I was right!" She shouted triumphantly. Her running pace picked up.

Katara looked ahead of her and suddenly realized what Toph was running to. "Zuko!" she exclaimed loudly.

Zuko looked to their direction and, once he saw the two girls running towards him, his expression was of total disbelief. Toph caught up to him first. She dropped her shopping bags before throwing her arms tightly around his waist. Katara caught up to them and threw her arms around him too.

"Katara? Toph?" He sounded completely confused. He even blinked a few times, wondering if the two girls were just a hallucination.

"Zuko are you alright!" Katara asked quickly, she could feel tears coming to her eyes. It had been so long since she had seen anyone other than Toph from their home world. Now suddenly finding Zuko gave her a new sense of hope that they could find the others.

"We're so happy to see you!" Toph added before he could respond to Katara. "How have you been?"

"Have you seen any of the others?"

"Do you know where we are?"

Zuko, who had initially blushed at two girls hugging him, finally hugged them back. They had asked him so many questions in such a short amount of time that he simply answered, "I'm doing fine, and no I haven't seen the others."

Katara sniffed. "For a while, I was wondering if Toph and I were the only ones sent to this world."

"Yeah I was starting to feel that way too." Zuko replied. "I wanted to search for everyone but I can't get off this island. Every time I have tried, either a storm starts up or I end up back here. This ocean is impossible to navigate!"

"I guess you don't know much about the Grand Line." Katara giggled and Zuko shook his head.

"Where have you two been?" Zuko asked now curious at what the two girls from team Avatar had been up to. "Is anyone else traveling with you?"

"We're pirates now." Toph said proudly. "And no, we haven't found anyone else."

"Pirates!" Zuko jumped back a bit. "Why did you two join a pirate crew!"

"Don't worry, they're not like the pirates back at home, or even like most of the ones here. They are… good pirates?" Katara couldn't help but laugh as she said the last part of that statement. She knew no one from their world would ever take her seriously if she had implied that pirates can be the good guys. A thought came over her. "Hey you could join with us! Luffy said that any of our friends were welcome."

"You want me to be a pirate?" Zuko sounded very skeptical and a little surprised that she would ask him to do such a thing. "If I join a pirate crew, how will that look when we return home?"

"Zuko, we're in a different world, no one will ever know." Katara pointed out. "And this way we can travel to different islands easily; we will have a better chance of finding the others, just like we found you."

Zuko sighed knowing that Katara had a point.

Katara then noticed that his left upper arm was wrapped in a blood soaked cloth. "Zuko what happened!" Before he could answer, Katara had grabbed his arm and unwrapped the makeshift bandage.

"I got into a fight; it's not a big deal." Zuko replied trying to shrug it off.

Katara inspected the wound and noticed that something was stuck inside of it. "Did you get shot?"

"I guess." Zuko wasn't sure exactly what she meant. "They have strange weapons here; I think I heard someone call them guns."

"How did that happen?" Toph was now curious. "Why did someone shoot you?"

Zuko sighed again. "I don't have any of the currency they take here. So I have been getting money by catching criminals and turning them in for their bounty. This place is full of them. I don't go after any large bounties. Some people here have very weird powers. But anyway, the injury happened when I recently went after someone." Zuko didn't seem to want to give all the details.

"So you're a bounty hunter?" Toph laughed. "And you were worried that being a pirate would make you look bad at home?"

"Yeah I guess." Zuko laughed with her.

Katara wasn't too amused. "Well I can't heal this until after the bullet is removed, or else it will be stuck inside of your arm. We'll take you back to the ship and Chopper can take care of it."

"Chopper?" Zuko repeated.

"He's our doctor." Toph explained. "Don't worry; he's not the scary kind."

Zuko finally gave in and followed the girls back to the Going Merry. There was no way that he was getting out of at least meeting the pirates that Katara and Toph had been traveling with. Katara knew that he was still very skeptical. She didn't blame him, after all, if the situation had been reversed, and he had been the one to ask her to join a pirate crew, she would have thought that he was out of his mind.

When they returned to the Going Merry, the first person Katara saw on the ship was Sanji.

"Katara-chan you're back!" Sanji exclaimed with hearts in his eyes. Then he saw Zuko, and his expression turned grim. "Hey who is that? Is some weird guy following you? I can take care of him if he's a stalker."

Zuko gulped but Katara stepped in. "No, he's one of mine and Toph's friends." She paused and attempted to change the subject. "Is Chopper there?"

"Yeah he's up here with Usopp." Sanji was still glaring at Zuko.

Katara decided that she had to redirect his attention. She felt a little bad for what she was about to do, although she could see Nami using this tactic. "Um Sanji, you know, these shopping bags are very heavy, could you come down and bring them on the Merry for us?"

Sanji's eyes turned to hearts once again. "Of course Katara-chan! Anything for you!" Sanji jumped down, picked up all the bags that Katara and Toph were carrying and jumped right back onto the ship.

"That guy is weird." Zuko commented.

"Oh he's our cook," Katara explained. "And if you couldn't tell, he really likes women."

Toph was laughing hard. "Wow Katara, I never expected you to do that. I'm kind of proud of you."

Katara frowned at her. "I just had to distract Sanji. The last thing we need is him staring at Zuko with that face." She didn't want Zuko to be scared away from the Straw Hats all because Sanji was a little jealous, which he had no reason to be.

Once they had boarded the ship Katara looked around for Chopper. She saw him with Usopp, and of all times to be doing the chopstick in the nose and mouth basket dance, it had to be now. Great how was she supposed to convince Zuko to take him seriously as a doctor? And why exactly were they doing that dance now? There was no celebration; maybe they were trying to modify it. On closer inspection, Katara saw that the chopsticks had been painted different colors and she figured that they both must have been bored.

Katara cleared her throat. "Chopper, can you come here? My friend needs help." she spoke seriously.

Chopper and Usopp looked towards Katara, and Chopper quickly stood up and ran towards her. "What happened Katara?"

Zuko's eyes widened at the sight. "You're doctor is a d-"

Toph elbowed Zuko hard into his side to quiet him. She quickly whispered. "Don't worry he's the best one around."

"Yeah but-" Zuko's voice sounded very concerned.

"Just trust me." Toph said shortly, Chopper was just about in ear shot of her.

Chopper approached Zuko and looked up at him curiously.

"Chopper, he was shot and he needs a bullet removed from his arm." Katara pointed to the injury. "Can you help him?"

Chopper smiled, "That will be easy." He ran to get his medical equipment and quickly returned.

"Who is your friend?" Chopper asked before starting.

"His name is Zuko." Katara responded. "We found him here in Jaya. And he's a fire bender."

"Fire bender!" Chopper's eyes turned to stars. "I wanna see!"

"Fix his arm first." Katara laughed.

Chopper's face dropped and then became serious. "Oh that's right I almost forgot!"

Zuko looked like he was more unsure of this doctor, but he didn't protest. If he wanted to remain with Katara and Toph, he was going to have to trust their judgment.

"I'll give you pain killers first." Chopper handed Zuko medicine. "It should work in about five minutes."

Five minutes passed and Zuko had to admit that his arm was no longer hurting. Chopper then began to extract the bullet.

"Hold still." He ordered and stuck a medical instrument into his arm. Zuko cringed a little when Chopper removed the bullet, the pain killers were good, but they couldn't completely take it away. Chopper checked to make sure that everything was out. He removed a few more fragments. Finally, he looked at Katara and smiled. "Ok Katara, go ahead and heal him."

Katara smiled back at Chopper. "Thank you Chopper." Katara then used some water to heal Zuko's arm.

Zuko looked at Chopper. "Wow, you really did a good job." He commented.

Choppers face dropped then he suddenly got a huge smile on his face. "No I'm not happy you complemented me you asshole!"

"But you seem happy…" Zuko replied looking very confused.

Katara laughed again. "Don't worry, that is just how Chopper is."

"Hey show us your fire bending." Usopp finally jumped in. "By the way, I am the great Captain Usopp of the East Blue!" He struck a heroic pose as he introduced himself.

Toph grinned. "No he's really just the sniper, Luffy is our captain." As amusing as it could have been, Toph did not want Zuko to think that Usopp really was the captain given the circumstances.

"Toph you make me sad." Usopp sank to his knees.

Zuko looked at Katara, very concerned. Katara could only guess what he was thinking. Usopp and Chopper were very childlike, and fire was a dangerous element.

"Yeah Zuko show us your fire bending!" Chopper grinned following Usopp's lead.

"Alright." Zuko agreed. "But something small, I don't want to catch the boat on fire." Zuko put his hand out and a flame appeared.

"So cool!" They both had stars in their eyes. After admiring Zuko's abilities, Sanji called them both to do something. Katara figured that he was just trying to get them to leave the three benders alone.

Once it was just Zuko, Katara, and Toph, Zuko was the first to speak. "They are amused very easily. And they are nothing like what I expected."

Katara and Toph laughed. "Oh just wait till you meet the captain." Katara replied. "But don't worry, they are all good people." She paused and frowned. "Except for the newest member. She was our enemy in Alabasta, I can't believe Luffy would just let her join!"

Toph only groaned, she was not all in the mood to argue with Katara about Robin. Especially after finding one of their friends.

Zuko spoke next. "I was once your enemy."

Katara huffed. "Yeah, but that was different. Aang needed a fire bending teacher. And if you did betray us… again, we could have easily taken care of you." She then looked worried. "If Robin betrays us, there is nothing we can do. She has the ability to put her body parts on anything. In Alabasta, she put her arms all over me and choked me, I really thought that I was going to die!"

Zuko didn't seem to hear the last part of what Katara had said. "She can put any of her body parts on anything?" His face then got red and his eyes widened.

Katara noticed and clenched her teeth. She knew exactly what he was thinking. "Zuko, I'd expect Sokka and Aang's mind go there, not yours!"

"And she put her arms all over your body?" His face got even redder and he had ignored Katara's previous statement.

"Zuko!" Katara yelled loudly. She had never seen this side of Zuko. After speaking about one of the most terrifying moments of her life, why did he have to go and make it dirty?

"Sorry! I'm trying not to think that!" Zuko's said quickly and slightly panicked. His face was still red. "But the way you put it, I couldn't help it."

Toph was cracking up laughing. "I didn't know you had a dirty mind Zuko, I always thought that you would have been shy about that stuff."

Zuko continued to blush and hoped that the conversation would move on to something else.

When things had calmed down, Katara tried her best to explain the world to Zuko. She talked about devil fruits, the grand line, pirates, the great pirate era, the one piece, the marines, everything that she had learned so far from her new friends. And she talked about the crew members and what their specialties were.

"If these fruits give you a special power but they take away your ability to swim." Zuko began. "Why would anyone who has eaten one want to be traveling on the ocean?"

Katara's eyes widened. "I never thought of that."

She then heard someone boarding the ship. She turned to see Nami looking very angry, and dragging Luffy and Zoro behind her. Usopp, Chopper, and Sanji came onto the ship's deck to see what all the commotion was about.

"Nami what's wrong?" Katara asked.

Nami dropped Luffy and Zoro. "These two idiots got attacked by pirates and neither even bothered to fight back! It was so humiliating!"

"Did you at least find anything out about Sky Island?" Usopp asked.

Nami suddenly looked even angrier. With her fist clenched she replied "When I asked about Sky Island, everyone just laughed at me!"

"Oh so you didn't find any information?" Katara heard Robin's voice boarding the ship.

Nami shot the older woman a cold look "Robin, this is all your fault!" She yelled. "If you hadn't gone on and on about Sky Islands existing I wouldn't have looked so stupid in that bar!"

"Oh that's a shame." Robin said smiling. "But, you may find this interesting." Robin handed over a piece of paper to Nami.

Nami looked at it and her eyes widened. "It's another map of Skypea!" She then threw her arms around Robin. "Robin you are the best!"

Katara looked at Zuko and saw that he had an expression of disbelief. Never had he seen some go from being angry at someone, to hugging them affectionately in a matter of seconds.

"By the way, who is the new person?" Robin looked towards Zuko.

Katara eyes widened. She had completely forgotten to introduce Zuko. "Oh Toph and I found one of our friends, this is Zuko." Katara paused feeling a little nervous. "Luffy, do you think he could join the crew?"

Luffy suddenly sat up, smiled widely and replied "Sure it's fine."

Katara nearly felt her jaw drop. That was almost too easy. She then officially introduced Zuko to the rest of the crew members.

"Hey where did you get that really cool scar on your eye!" Luffy asked genuinely curious.

Nami punched him on top of the head. "Luffy that's rude!"

Katara's heart dropped at the question. She wasn't sure if that question would be hurtful to Zuko.

Zuko smiled and simply answered "I got it burned in a fight a long time ago."

"Wow it's so cool!" Luffy continued and was hit on the head once again by Nami.

"Luffy stop it!" She yelled.

"Yay we have a new nakama!" Chopper cheered. "Luffy! Zuko can fire bend!"

Luffy's eyes then became stars. "Fire bend? Show me some!"

Zuko did another simple fire bending trick, similar to the one he had shown to Usopp and Chopper.

Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp all surrounded him and cheered. "Do more!" Luffy shouted excitedly.

Zuko, looking nervous, did a little more fire bending.

"More." Luffy cheered.

Zoro seemed to notice that Zuko was a little uncomfortable and he stepped in. "Hey guys, you're asking too much, leave him alone."

"Yeah, give him some time to adjust before you ask him to entertain you." Nami added.

Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper looked a little sad. "Ok." They all three said at the same time.

"We have to plan for the party anyway." Luffy suddenly cheered up. He, Chopper, and Usopp ran off.

"Geez those guys can really be a hand full." Nami commented, she had sweat dripping down her face. Sanji, Zoro, and Robin were still gathered around, as well as the three benders. "By the way, we are running low on funds, we need to make more money to buy supplies." The jewels that Robin had recently given her would help out, but they still were not enough.

Zuko suddenly pulled out two large bags of berries. "If you guys need money, you can have this." He figured that if he was going to be a part of a pirate crew, he might as well help out however he can.

Nami looked inside the bags and her eyes lit up. "Katara! Toph! I love your friend already!" She threw her arms around Zuko, making him blush heavily.

"What did we say about giving him time!" Zoro yelled at Nami.

"Nami-swan are you choosing the new guy over me!" Sanji's jaw was dropped and the hearts in his eyes were broken.

"She's not you dumbass cook!" Zoro yelled at him and the two immediately began to fight.

Robin laughed at everything and Katara just hung her head. They were going to scare Zuko off before night fall.

XXXXXXXXXX

Later that evening, the entire crew was sitting around a table with mugs of rum. It was tradition to throw a little celebration when a new member joined the crew. Zuko however, looked to be a little uncomfortable with all the attention on him.

"To our new nakama Zuko!" Luffy toasted. Everyone hit their mugs together and began to drink.

"Hey we didn't do this for Robin!" Usopp suddenly pointed out.

Luffy's eyes got huge and he held up his mug again. "To our other new nakama Robin." Everyone toasted again, Katara doing so reluctantly.

She began to gulp her rum. Toph took a sip and made a face.

"Hey don't drink so fast, you'll get sick!" Zuko grabbed Katara's arm.

"Don't worry, I have to get my tolerance up." Katara's face was already turning red. After seeing how much her new friends could drink, Katara was determined to be capable of consuming that much alcohol.

Toph laughed. "She's really funny when she gets drunk, I wouldn't stop her."

Katara suddenly stopped drinking and frowned, remembering what had happened during the party the Straw Hats had thrown when she and Toph joined the crew. She really did not want Zuko, or anyone else to see her act like that again. She slammed her mug on to the table. "You're right Zuko, I should pace myself."

When the party winded down, Katara spoke with Zuko. "So, what do you think of… everyone." She asked feeling a little nervous as she anticipated his response.

Zuko thought for a moment. "They are very... quirky. The captain, Luffy, he's different from any other leader I have ever met." He paused and looked at Katara with the same skeptical look he had given her earlier. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"

Katara laughed. "Don't worry, when I first joined, I didn't trust them at all. And I was really only using them to travel to other islands to find everyone. But after everything that happened at Alabasta, I came to realize that they are good people." Katara was quiet. "And he may not look it, but Luffy is incredibly strong."

"I do have to admit that was the friendliest welcome I've ever received." Zuko stated remembering back to when he joined team avatar. "When I showed those three my fire bending, I didn't do anything that impressive but they acted like it was the greatest thing they had ever seen." Zuko had a look of confusion on his face. Even when he was a child, the fire bending that he had shown those three would not have impressed him.

Katara laughed. "Yeah, it doesn't take much to entertain them. They themselves can do some pretty amazing things."

It was getting darker and everyone was heading off to bed. Katara hoped that nothing would scare Zuko away from this pirate crew. Traveling with the Straw Hats may be her only chance to find all her friends, most of all Aang.

XXXXXXXXX

A/N: Zuko is now part of the crew. Originally, I had intended for this fic to start at this point, right before heading to Skypea. But then I wanted some drama for Enies Lobby so I chose to start it in Alabasta. I waited for this point in the fic to bring in Zuko so that Alabasta didn't become convoluted. (I only wanted to add one villain to that arc and 3 on 1 sounded a bit too much.)

Unfortunately for Sanji, Zuko is very attractive, as evidence by his legions and legions of fan girls.

And I know it might be out of character to give Zuko a dirty mind. But everyone I know that watches One Piece has made some kind of dirty joke about Robin's abilities, especially if they are guys.


	18. Montblanc Cricket

Zuko walked out onto the deck of the Going Merry. Despite being up late the previous night, he had still managed to wake up at the crack of dawn, something that he had always done naturally. The only other crew member that he knew that was awake was Sanji, and Zuko assumed that he was always up early to make breakfast.

The morning was a little chilly and breezy and Zuko wished that he had warmer clothes. He walked further onto the deck and was startled once he realized the he wasn't alone. Nico Robin was sitting in one of the beach chairs reading a book. She hadn't even acknowledged him.

"Um good morning." He said to her uncomfortably. Zuko remembered that Katara had said that she was once an enemy. Though he thought that Katara was exaggerating on how much of a threat Robin was, he still wanted to be careful.

Robin only smiled at him and responded, "Good morning." She then glanced back down at her book and continued to read.

Zuko looked over the edge of the Going Merry. He could barely see Jaya from where he stood. Today they would be searching for someone named Mont Blanc Cricket, hoping to find more information on Skypea. Zuko looked into the sky. Katara had said that their next destination would be to an island in the sky; an island that no one was sure existed. He wondered how exactly they were supposed to get up there.

Zuko thought back to Robin. Katara had told him that she was often up late into the night reading. If that were the case, why was she awake so early? Did she ever sleep? Or had she simply not gone to bed for the night? Whatever the case, it was a little awkward that there was only silence between the two.

"What are you reading?" Zuko asked, not even sure if he really cared, but at least he could make conversation.

Robin looked up and smiled. "It's a history book about the period before Roger's reign."

"Oh." Zuko responded. He knew nothing of this world's history and didn't know how to respond to Robin's answer.

Luckily, he heard commotion coming from inside of the ship. He immediately recognized that the voices belonged to Luffy and Sanji.

"Luffy I told you to stay out of the kitchen!" Sanji yelled.

"But I'm hungry." Luffy responded bursting out onto the deck. Chopper and Usopp were not far behind. Luffy's arm then stretched and grabbed onto the mast of the ship and, after grabbing Chopper and Usopp, he used his rubber body to pull the three of them far away from Sanji.

Zuko's eyes widened at the sight. He knew that Luffy had the ability to do that, but actually seeing it was another thing altogether.

Nami and Katara came next. Katara still looked very tired and Nami was checking the log pose after scolding Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp. Zuko figured that Toph wouldn't be awake until close to noon, and he wasn't sure about Zoro. He sighed as he watched the crew's antics and every so often, gave Katara a concerned glance.

XXXXXXXXX

[Katara's POV]

Later that day, the Going Merry was approaching the spot marked on the map where they would find Mont Blanc Cricket. As they approached, Katara saw a huge structure that from a distance looked like it could have been a very elaborate mansion. As the ship got closer, something didn't seem quite right about it.

"Look a castle!" Luffy exclaimed pointing to the structure.

"It looks amazing! He must be rich!" Chopper cried his eyes wide in amazement.

"Look closer." Zoro pointed.

Sanji shook his head. "That guy is just a show off."

"What do you mean?" Chopper looked at the two of them.

The Going Merry drifted to the side of the house and Katara realized that the castle was simply just a board put up to make the house look like a castle. What was even more unusual was that half the house was gone and the board covered the missing part.

Zuko only sighed, "Why are people here so weird." He mumbled audible enough for Katara to hear.

"What's going on?" Toph asked, unable to see but was able to hear the rest of the crew's comments. Usopp explained to her what they were seeing.

As everyone exited the Merry, Nami spoke. "Robin," she began, "You said that people in town referred to Cricket as a dreamer. What did he dream about?"

"I don't' know all the details, but he talked about a large amount of gold being hidden on Jaya island."

Nami's eyes widened, and she pointed to the ground. "Chopper start digging!"

Chopper, fearing Nami, did exactly as she ordered and began to dig into the ground with his antlers.

"I wonder where he is." Sanji looked around some more.

"Let's go look in his house!" Luffy suggested. He walked over and opened the door to the half house and stepped inside.

"Luffy wait, you shouldn't just walk into someone's house!" Katara called out to him but it was too late, Luffy was already inside. Katara sighed realizing that she should have expected this.

"It looks like no one is home." Luffy said from inside of the house.

Chopper continued to dig for gold and Toph went over to join him. She was able to use her earth bending to dig faster, though she wasn't expecting to find any gold. Katara figured that she was just bored.

"I don't feel anyone on this island." Toph announced. "That house is made of stone, and I don't feel anyone in there either."

"Maybe he's not home?" Usopp suggested.

"Hey look, a picture book." Nami said holding up a book she found on a tree stump.

Katara and the others went over to look at what Nami had found.

"Norland the Liar?" Sanji read the title, "That brings me back. I used to hear that story all the time."

Nami looked at him. "But it says that it was published in North Blue."

"Yeah I was born there." Sanji explained. "But I grew up in the East Blue." He then went on to explain the story of Norland, how he went out to sea and returned to report that he had found an island that had a mountain of gold. The king had sent out an expedition of 2000 men to find the city, but when they arrived on the island, it was nothing but a jungle. Norland was sentenced to death for lying; however his final words were "The mountain of gold must have sunk into the sea." No one believed him.

During the story, after Norland had announced that that the island must have fallen into the ocean, Luffy went over to the edge of Jaya, crouched down, and looked into the water.

"In the North Blue, parents used to tell their children to not be a liar like Norland." Sanji continued. "Though he is said to be a fictional character, some believe he actually existed. He would have lived over 400 years ago."

There was a loud splash and everyone quickly turned to find the source of the sound.

"Luffy fell into the water!" Usopp exclaimed.

There was another loud splashing sound as a large man jumped out from the water and landed on Jaya.

"You kids have a lot of nerve entering someone's house without permission!" The man yelled angrily. "This area is my territory and if you are looking for the gold, then prepare to die!" The man charged at the Straw Hats.

"Usopp get Luffy!" Sanji ordered. He then jumped in to intercept the man's attack.

Katara wondered if she should help Sanji, but the fight didn't last long enough for her to take any action. The larger man suddenly fell to his knees and he began to cough up blood. Sanji, seeing that the man was weak, stopped his attack.

Chopper stopped digging and ran over to the fallen man. He checked him over. "Get him inside! He needs to rest!"

Zoro and Sanji dragged the man into his house and laid him in his bed. Chopper immediately began to examine him. Katara sat next to him, hoping to help.

"He has dysbarism; it is often experienced by divers." Chopper explained. "It's not a long term illness and it should pass soon."

Katara had never heard of such an illness.

"He just needs to rest, open all the windows and bring me some cold towels." Chopper ordered. "He must have been diving every day for this to happen."

Katara ran to get the towels, as she returned the door to the house busted open and two monkey's, one being Masira entered.

"Boss are you alright!" They both cried. They looked less than thrilled to see the straw hat pirates standing in their Boss's house. Zuko looked a little surprised to see two talking monkey's standing in the door way.

"What are you doing to our boss!" They both shouted at the same time.

"Calm down," Luffy said seriously. "We are taking care of him."

Their demeanor suddenly changed. "You are such wonderful people!"

Luffy continued to speak to the monkeys and learned that the other one was named Shojo. Katara continued to help Chopper tend to the sick man. It wasn't long until he awoke. He sat up slowly and looked at everyone who was in his house.

"Thank you for helping me out, and sorry that I attacked you earlier." He began. "I thought you were like everyone else who came here for gold."

"Gold!" Nami's eyes sparkled.

"Hey don't start that right now!" Usopp warned, obviously worried about upsetting the man again.

Luffy suddenly turned to face him. "No we just want to know how to get to Sky Island." He said this very optimistically.

"Sky Island?" The man laughed. "You guys believe in that?"

Katara sighed, wondering if they wouldn't be getting help from this man. She looked over at Zuko who looked skeptical.

"I don't know if it exists." The man continued, "But I knew a man who said it was real, he was a great liar."

Luffy looked at Usopp and Usopp quickly responded that he wasn't talking about him.

"Norland, the king of the liars, he was my great great great grandfather." The man revealed. "It's an old legend, but the entire Montblanc family is still bad mouthed to this day." He paused. "However, none of us hate him for it."

"Why not?" Toph asked curiously.

"Because Norland, was a very honest man." He answered.

Everyone looked at him confused.

The man went on to explain that while the story describes Norland grinning before his execution, in reality, he was actually crying at the injustice that was being done. He also went on to say that they really were on the island where Norland found his gold. He continued to tell them that he was trying to prove his ancestor right by finding the city of gold. The apes he had met one day and had become "fans" of his story and begged to become his followers. The man finally introduced himself as Monblanc Cricket.

"Alright," Luffy said once he was finished. "Can you tell me how to get to Sky Island? Does it exist?"

Cricket laughed. "Impatient are you?" He went to grab a book. "This is Norland's log book."

Nami grabbed the book and began to read. She read parts out loud that included Norland describing items that would have come from a sky island.

"So it must exist!" Usopp said happily.

"Yeah but how do we get up there?" Nami asked.

"I think I might have a way." Cricket said. He then told everyone about the knock up stream.

Katara eyed Zuko who seemed to look very worried. Katara herself felt a little nervous. Riding up the knock up stream sounded very dangerous. She could only imagine the Merry falling off the stream and crashing down into the ocean.

After the long explanation, Sanji cooked dinner for everyone and soon everyone was eating and drinking in celebration of going to sky island. The monkeys and Cricket were quite pleased with how delicious the meal was.

"Do they always party?" Zuko asked Katara.

Katara laughed. "Well if there is a reason to celebrate they will."

Robin was sitting away from everyone reading further into Norland's log book. "This is interesting." She spoke. "In the skull's right eye, the gold is seen."

Cricket looked at her. "I have been trying to figure out what that means." He replied. "Maybe it's a death wish." He concluded laughing.

He began to speak more about Sky Island and even pulled out some gold that he had found. One was a statue of a small beautiful golden bell. And another was a statue of a bird, called a south bird holding a bell.

"Bird holding a golden bell?" Sanji questioned. "Do you think it could be some sort of symbol?"

"We believe that it might be." Cricket answered. "This is a south bird and they still live on this island."

Both his and the monkey's faces suddenly dropped. "Damn it!" All three said at once.

"What?" Nami asked concerned.

"You need to go into the forest right away and catch a south bird!" Cricket said quickly. He then explained that in order to get to the place where the knock up stream would erupt, they would have to go directly south, and they would not be able to follow the log pose to that location. A south bird always points south, and would allow them to navigate to the exact spot without losing direction.

XXXXXXXXX

The straw hats had split up into groups of three. Katara was traveling with Toph and Zuko. She couldn't help but laugh that the three benders had grouped up together.

"Toph, can you feel anything that is in the shape of the bird?" Katara asked wanting to find the south bird quickly. It was cold that night and she wasn't exactly dressed for the weather.

"No I can't." Toph replied. "I don't feel anything that is even similar to the shape of that statue."

Zuko spoke next. "Katara are you sure this is a good idea? That boat could easily fall apart if it is shot into the sky."

Katara sighed. "Well, I think Nami and Usopp might be able to find a way around it." Katara knew the two were very smart.

"It sounds like a death sentence." Zuko groaned.

Katara almost wanted to agree, but somehow, she felt that things would be alright.

"Why are you two being such scardy cats?" Toph spoke. "That Cricket guy said that as long as we get into the right spot, then we will be fine."

"Yeah that's the part that worries me." Zuko spoke.

A loud low humming was heard and Katara and Zuko looked around to see what had made that noise. Suddenly, a lot of insects, that included centipedes, spiders, ants, and among others began falling from the sky. Not only that, but the bugs were much bigger than what Katara was used to.

"What is wrong with this forest!" Katara covered her head and looked for a place to run for cover. She didn't mind bugs, but she didn't like having them rain on her.

Zuko also did not appreciate the insects. "What is with this place!" He covered his head with one arm and slapped a centipede off his face with the other.

"Oh come on they are just bugs-" Toph began but then stopped suddenly. Her face went white. "Oh my God one just fell down the back of my shirt! Get it out!" Toph began to thrash around.

Zuko ran over to help her. "Calm down!" He instructed. "You know, you're the last person that I would expect to be afraid of bugs!"

"I'm not afraid of them!" Toph yelled, still thrashing.

Katara looked at Toph sympathetically. "Well, she did have a recent unpleasant history with a situation similar to this."

The bug did fall out of Toph shirt and it turned out to be a centipede. Toph was still not happy. She stomped her foot down, rose a boulder out of the ground, and rushed it at a tree.

"Alright you stupid bird! Come out!" She yelled feeling impatient.

"Um Toph, you'll probably scare it away if you do that." Katara spoke feeling a little stressed.

Before anyone could say anything else, the humming was heard again and more bugs, much bigger than the ones from before began to emerge from the forest. There were large grasshoppers, centipedes, moths, and spiders all coming for them.

"Ew!" Katara couldn't help but yell and she began to water bend.

"Where are they all coming from!" Zuko shouted and used his fire bending to burn the bugs. Many of the bugs ran off after they had caught on fire.

"Zuko be careful, you might set the forest on fire!" Katara pointed out.

"What do you want me to do then?" He asked quickly, understanding Katara's point.

Katara fought off a giant centipede. "I don't know, find the south bird!"

Toph used her earth bending to fight off any of the giant bugs that came near her. She was more brutal towards the spiders, than the other bugs. She had had enough of spiders back in Alabasta.

More and more bugs came after them, and they only seemed to get bigger. Zuko, unable to find the south bird, pulled out his swords and began to fight off the insects. There seemed to be almost no end to the swarm.

XXXXXXXXXXX

It felt like they had been fighting off the armies of bugs for hours. But eventually, the Straw Hats had met up once everything had calmed. Much to Katara's dismay, Robin had caught a south bird. Everyone believed that her catching the bird is what stopped the insects, as if the bird was somehow controlling them.

They made their way back to Cricket's house, only to come upon a grim sight. Cricket, Masira and Shojo were all beaten badly. In the time that the straw hats were gone, someone must have come and attacked his house. Luffy demanded to know what had happened, and once he heard the name Bellamy, Luffy immediately stormed off to town.

"Bellamy?" Katara repeated. "Who is that?"

Nami breathed. "He was the guy that started the fight in the bar yesterday. Luffy and Zoro didn't even try to fight back." Nami then glared at Zoro.

"Where did the captain go?" Zuko asked looking in the direction Luffy had run.

"He's going after Bellamy." Usopp replied.

"Only because Luffy hurt one of his friends." Sanji added.

Luffy wasn't gone for too long. He came back holding on to the things that were taken from Cricket. Cricket was grateful that Luffy had taken care of Bellamy. After a long eventful night, it was time to rest up for what was to happen tomorrow.

XXXXXXXXXXX

A/N: Sorry this chapter took forever to come out. School got in the way and this was the one part of the story I was dreading to write. Not because I don't like it or anything, it is important to the overall Skypea story. It just wasn't fun to write. I had to continuously reference the manga because I didn't remember this part very well and eventually, I just had to force myself through it. This chapter will probably get an edit down the line.

I'll be moving at the end of the month, so the next update might not come until the end of February.


	19. Author's note

Author's note: Hey everyone. I gave birth to twins shortly after I posted the last chapter of this story. And I seriously thought that I could continue this story in my free time. (There is no free time with twins I have found out) So I have given irishauthor94 permission to adopt this story. Please continue to read the story if you are still interested and thank you for reading.


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